


keeping it together ('cause we gotta try)

by anomalation



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Basically all the friendships, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, F/M, Gen, Lesbian Lydia Martin, M/M, Miscommunications but only the fun ones, Multi, Pack Family, Pack Mom Stiles Stilinski, Past Torture, bisexuals everywhere, some light PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-25
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-17 08:22:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 52,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28971279
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anomalation/pseuds/anomalation
Summary: “We’ll be here for you this time,” Liam said.“You’ll be here?” Theo asked, and let himself look at Liam for his reaction. He regretted it immediately. Liam was there, paying attention, and Theo forgot about the entire existential threat facing them broadly because all he could think about was the way Liam was… just, was.“We’re on the clock here, boys,” Lydia whispered, and set off for the school at a decent pace considering the three inch heels she was wearing.“This freaking fear monster,” Theo thought he heard Liam mumble as they followed her.Theo's trying to figure out how to be part of the team and also how to be a teenager with a crush, all while taking out the Anuk-Ite and an evil guidance counselor. Once that's all over, though, Liam's just worried about feeling too hard and ruining things. Basically a season 6B rewrite.
Relationships: Allison Argent/Isaac Lahey/Scott McCall/Kira Yukimura, Chris Argent/Melissa McCall/Sheriff Stilinski, Derek Hale & Stiles Stilinski, Ethan/Jackson Whittemore, Liam Dunbar/Theo Raeken, Lydia Martin/Malia Tate
Comments: 17
Kudos: 76





	keeping it together ('cause we gotta try)

**Author's Note:**

> Okay this is the last Teen Wolf thing for a while. There's just something so romantic about insisting you don't care about anyone and then repeatedly risking your life for one person in particular, and about being someone who cares about everyone so hard you forget to ask for help ever. What can I say? I had to do something with that, I had no choice. 
> 
> As usual for me, Derek and Stiles are friends that fight like a married couple while the age difference is too weird. Also Malia's just a werewolf because I found 'werecoyote' to be an incredibly stupid pointless distinction.

Theo hadn’t gone to hell, actually. It just felt like he had. Felt so much like that that he hadn’t figured out that it wasn’t that. Not until Kira mentioned, off-hand, that she could trap Monroe in an illusion, and Theo told her they weren’t going to solve this with the power of imagination. At that, everybody looked at him with varying degrees of pity and annoyance. Liam was the one who told him. “That’s what she did to you,” he said, with gentleness that made Theo feel like he was burning alive.

“Oh,” he said. He couldn’t breathe. All he could feel was his sister clawing at his chest. “Well. Then, that would probably work.”

“But we’d have to get her alone,” Scott said, and they all returned to the conversation.

All except Theo, who was reeling from that revelation. He had a thick wall of nonchalance up to hide it, of course, just in case any of Scott’s pack was listening. They wouldn’t find his heart beating any faster if they tried. It wasn’t likely, but Theo was used to planning for contingencies. For senses sharper than his own to be fastened on him, listening for any sign of weakness. Even if that wasn’t how Scott worked, it wasn’t that far from possible.

So Theo leaned on the wall with his hands purposefully in his pockets and let it sink in. He hadn’t gone to hell. He’d been in an illusion. None of it had been real. That did something, to the knot in his chest that told him he deserved everything the afterlife held. It didn’t unravel it, not quite, but it made it feel different.

“Wait, I have an idea,” Mason said, and Theo tuned back in. It probably wouldn’t be completely stupid. Mason looked around at the group, clustered around the table they were using as command central, here at the vet’s. Deaton. He wasn’t here at the moment, which was good. Theo didn’t like him, he made Theo’s blood run cold. “They have numbers, right? So we need to even out our numbers. We need to call the Argents.”

That wasn’t a name Theo knew off the top of his head, but Scott’s reaction gave him a hint. Scott heaved the deep sigh that meant he was being emotional and dumb and Lydia made a face that thought Mason had a point. The two of them were easy to interpret; they never hid much. And then Theo connected the dots. Argent as in Allison Argent, Scott’s girlfriend and Lydia’s best friend. Theo had researched her, before he realized she wouldn’t be here. Her mom was dead. Her dad was an arms dealer. More firepower wouldn’t hurt.

“I’m not calling the Argents,” Scott said. Like an idiot.

“We could also call Jackson and Ethan,” Kira suggested, with the expression that meant she didn’t expect to be listened to. The name Jackson rang a bell, but Theo couldn’t exactly place it.

“Why?” Scott said. “So they can maybe die here too? I’m not bringing anyone else into this.”

“You think we’ll die here?” Malia said, in her flat voice. She moved even closer to Lydia, protectively.

Scott did think that, but he was being a good little pack leader and didn’t want to admit it. “No,” he lied. And even his unobservant pack had to know that wasn’t true.

Malia did. She looked at Lydia pointedly. “Okay,” Lydia said with finality. “I’m going to do what we should’ve done the moment this started going bad.” She pulled out her phone and dialed a number Theo couldn’t see. Whoever it was, Scott looked at the screen and then sighed. Liam looked too, but Theo couldn’t tell what he thought of it. Out of all of them, Liam was the one who was a challenge to understand. “You know I’m right,” Lydia said to Scott as it rang. Scott just sighed again; he did know.

A deep voice picked up. “Hello?”

“Hi,” Lydia said. “I need to talk to both of you.”

“We’re here, what’s the big emergency you can’t solve without me,” a second voice said, and this one Theo knew. It was Stiles. So that made the other voice Derek Hale. Neither of them would be top of the list of Theo’s biggest fans. But, then again, that list was basically empty.

“Beacon Hills knows about us,” Malia said, when no one else spoke. “And they’re hunting us.”

“What do you mean, knows about you,” Stiles began dismissively.

“Us,” Lydia said, “as in all of us. Supernatural beings.”

“What do you mean, hunting you?” Derek said. Theo thought he detected some dread. Good. So the guy was smart.

“Mom got shot,” Scott said, and his voice cracked. “She’ll be okay, but. It could’ve…”

“And Liam was almost killed in Biology,” Mason said.

“They threw your dad out of the station for protecting us,” Lydia said to her phone. “Total martial law.”

“And Theo was tortured,” Liam said, and Theo did not stare at him because that would be the kind of giveaway that even Scott wouldn’t miss. But he did notice that Liam mentioned it, and he noticed that Corey rolled his eyes.

“They have killed other supernatural creatures,” Kira said. “Just nobody in our pack, yet. But they’re trying, and they’re not going to stop until we stop them.”

There was a brief pause, filled with the sound of eye contact on the other end of the call that they were missing. “We’ll be there in eight hours,” Derek finally said.

“Six,” Stiles said. “There’s a flight leaving in forty minutes.”

“How am I supposed to pack in less than-”

“All your shirts look the same anyways, they’re all olive and very fashionably-”

“Derek,” Malia said loudly.

“Yes?” Derek answered.

“They’ve been testing people, to see if they shift. Cutting people’s hands.”

“I’ll make sure I pass,” Derek said. “Anything else?”

“We’re at Deaton’s,” Kira said.

“We’ll come straight there,” Stiles said, uncharacteristically serious. “See you soon.”

“Bye,” Lydia said, and hung up. She looked at Scott then. “We should call Argent, at the very least. You know he left stashes around here. There’s gotta be something he could do.”

Scott was going to give in; that was clear from how he shifted uncomfortably. He really thought that bringing anyone else in was unfair - like it was fair to those of them that were already mixed up in this with no fucking choice? - but saying that would just make this worse, so Theo waited, impatient, for Scott to reach the conclusion they all knew he would. “Okay,” Scott said. “But I don’t want to bring Allison and Isaac into this.”

Isaac. Another werewolf Theo had studied up on for nothing. He’d ended up in France with the Argents, for some reason. His dad had been one of the deaths that led Theo back to Beacon Hills, the obviousness of it piquing Theo’s interest. He expected to find werewolves. He didn’t expect to find a pack like this. It was actually starting to be intimidating, how many people were in Scott’s pack if he ever called them all together. Theo had never heard of an alpha letting his pack scatter like Scott did. But then, he hadn’t seen another true alpha before, either. The phrase still made Theo’s chest feel tight. Something about Scott was more, and better. It inspired all kinds of people to give Scott endless loyalty, including these Argents.

Whoever he was, Argent had a gravelly voice, and nothing they said seemed to alarm him at all. That was the kind of person Theo wished they had around, even as much as it gave him a cold feeling all over. The Doctors had been unflappable - though that probably had a lot to do with them not really being human anymore - but that just made them good at what they did. And Argent, no doubt, was good at what he did. He had a safe house he offered to them, and then spent a lot of time talking Corey through how to deactivate the security measures. Corey would be going first, hiding them by taking them with him two at a time. That meant pairing up, and that meant Theo got to experience his least favorite thing; picking teams. Not that he'd ever been last picked for dodgeball or whatever, but he could see why that occupied so much space in teen dramas. It fucking sucked, watching the couples obviously pick each other and having to realize that he and Liam were the only ones left.

Liam was gracious about it, but that made it kind of worse. He put on a semi-convincing fake smile as he came over to Theo. Mason and Corey came with him. “We should probably go first,” he said. “In case there are any defenses Argent forgot about.”

“He doesn’t forget,” Mason said.

“Don’t you need to get out of here?” Theo said to him. “You’re normal, after all.”

Corey took offense to that, of course. He heard the veiled dig. And he started to argue, but Mason stopped him. “I _should_ actually probably get going,” Mason said. Reluctant, like all of them were, to admit when Theo was actually right. 

For whatever reason, Liam didn’t take their side. “Be careful,” he said to Mason. “And we’ll keep our phones on.”

“I will too,” Mason nodded, and he hugged Liam goodbye. “Be safe,” he said, to Liam and to Corey and not to Theo. Not that it mattered. Theo didn’t need anyone to want him to be safe; he never had before, and didn’t now, and it was fine. He didn’t like Mason for a lot of reasons, not the least of which was how Mason had been the Beast and also how Mason was often, annoyingly, correct.

“Can you drive?” Liam asked Theo. “I think they know Corey’s car.”

And all the cops knew about Theo and his truck was that they kept finding him sleeping in it. Theo wasn’t exactly eager to let them in, but he couldn’t think of a way to get out of this in the few seconds before it would be obvious he was was stalling. “Sure,” he said.

“Cool,” Liam said. Maybe this wouldn’t be the worst.

“Don’t strain yourself,” Corey said. So no, this was definitely going to suck.

The group did a little more planning. They’d lead the way, and everyone else would follow in Kira’s car. Kira was the other supernatural who was any kind of uncover. Theo had studied this pack extensively before getting involved, so he’d looked into Kira, Scott’s partner since the Argents left town. He’d found nothing strange. A clean record, not suspiciously clean. Kitsune were thorough.

Kitsune, Theo reminded himself, could trap people in illusions so total that he thought he was in hell for months. And Theo didn’t really have a moral compass, he knew that and reveled in it, but the prospect of doing that to someone else made his stomach flip. He didn’t object to it, but. Boy. When Kira mentioned it again as an option, Theo had to bite back a response.

In a way, it was a relief to head out, and be away from the rest of everybody. Pack meetings always made him feel out of control, trying to think of something he could be exposed for. But that relief only lasted a second, and then he had to move all his earthly belongings into one side of the back seat so Corey could get in. That was enough to wipe out his gratitude.

When they were all in the car, Liam looked over from the passenger seat and said, “How do we know you haven’t made some kind of deal to screw over the rest of us?” He looked preemptively stubborn about this, the way Liam often was.

“With the genocidal maniacs that want to kill every single one of us?” Theo started the engine. “How do you think that would work?”

“I don’t know. You seem to figure out a way.”

“Almost sounds like a compliment,” Theo said, to get under his skin. But all Liam did was twitch his shoulders in a shrug. “Well. No. I haven’t done anything like that.”

Corey spoke up from the back seat. “Why should we believe you?”

“I don’t know,” Theo snapped, frustrated and so a little too honest. He didn’t know why any of them would believe him ever. Hence why he wasn’t really comfortable around any of them. It was better to be around strangers.

Or it had been, until strangers had a 50/50 shot of wanting him dead too.

The drive was silent most of the way, except for Corey’s phone telling them where to go. The hideout was downtown, in the industrial part of town. Abandoned, this late at night, but covered with security cameras. The address pointed them to a one-story brick building that looked like it might’ve been an office, at one point.

Theo wasn’t totally stopped when the back door opened and shut and Corey hopped out. “Hey,” Theo frowned, but when he looked back there was nobody there. Corey was doing his thing, he was invisible. God damn it. It was freaky, that’s all. Theo’s discomfort had very little to do with how Corey definitely hated Theo. That was tertiary at best.

“Wait,” Liam said, as Theo finished parking. “How do you have a car?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, your whole family’s dead,” Liam pointed out, and Theo blinked at him. “And the Dread Doctors didn’t drive.”

Theo was briefly speechless. “Well, yeah,” he finally said.

“So where’d you get a car?”

“I bought it,” Theo said, feeling defensive for some reason.

“Okay,” Liam began, with a bit of a scoff, but before he could continue his door opened and he disappeared.

Right. They had shit to do, and people that wanted to kill them. Theo stifled his sigh and waited for Corey to get him too.

Corey wasn’t gentle; he opened the car door and grabbed Theo’s wrist and would’ve pulled him out if Theo hadn’t come on his own. His invisibility felt like a chill rushing over Theo, tinging his view with green. God. This was such a cool power. Theo should’ve taken it. Really fucking useful too, they were able to get inside easily. Well, relatively easily, given the insane security measures. Corey had to take them down a specific path towards the door, and then enter three separate sets of codes, and then wait fifteen seconds before heading any further in.

Corey let go of them once they were all inside with the doors shut. “I’ll wait outside,” he said, still invisible, and the door opened and shut again.

“He does not like you,” Liam said.

“Thanks, I wasn’t sure,” Theo grumbled.

“C’mon,” Liam said, and led Theo deeper inside. The safehouse was - unsurprisingly - complicated inside, a maze of hallways that looked like they were hiding several different ways to kill anyone walking past. There was a door after two turns. A keypad. Theo opened his mouth to ask if they’d need Corey for this too, but Liam typed in seven numbers and something buzzed and then clicked and the handle turned. So Liam had been paying attention, when Argent explained his security. Phew. Good.

Theo opened the door. The inside was surprisingly warm and homey. A wood-paneled bunker. Only one corner was dedicated to weapons and military paraphernalia. Then there was a set of couches, and a little kitchen, and a whole set up with monitors and towers and computer shit that Theo could feel humming with electric energy.

“Hey,” Liam said from behind, and Theo looked back to see Liam hesitating at the door. Liam put his hand up, and a purple force pushed it back from the threshold. Mountain ash. “Argent said there’s a switch inside,” he said.

Theo found the switch as Liam was talking, flipped it and then realized that he could’ve not. He could’ve locked them out, if he wanted to. Hunkered down until the town relaxed a little and then split. He should’ve done that, if he was looking out for himself. Scott’s pack was full of liabilities, as much as it was powerful. But Liam was right there, and it didn’t occur to Theo until too late.

“This place looks nice,” Liam said, looking around.

“Argents knew what they were doing, I guess,” Theo said. He watched Liam wander deeper in. Liam touched a lot of things in here, opened the fridge and a gun locker and sat on one of the beds to test it. Theo stayed where he was. In case there was a trap or something.

Once Liam was sitting on one couch, he looked back at Theo and then Theo had to figure out something to say. Something dumb ended up coming out. “So how are the Argents involved with all of this?"

Liam frowned at him. "You don't know?"

”No, I'm just asking you for fun.” He couldn't help but snap again, even though he knew damn well it wasn't the right way to get someone to tell him what he wanted to know. The night was full of things he didn’t know that he was apparently supposed to, so he was more than a little on edge.

But Liam didn't seem to care what was the right way. He rolled his eyes at Theo in a way that wasn't really mad. "Argent as in silver," he said. "They're hunters. Since, like. Revolutionary War days. They helped us with that Beast stuff."

Us did not include Theo. Theo had been pretty busy, at the time, with the chimera pack. At least, until he killed them.

Liam frowned at him. "You okay? You smell weird."

Fucking werewolf senses. Theo sealed up that whole train of thought and glared at Liam. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

"I mean like, in the way where..." Liam sighed. “Whatever. So. They’re hunters, but they changed sides after Scott and Allison started dating and there was a whole like, family feud and most of them died.”

Liam was absolutely the worst person to get information from. Theo wanted to be talking to literally anyone else. “Wait, what? Scott dated a hunter," Theo said, to make sure he had it clear. Not that it was that hard to believe. Scott could be supremely stupid.

"Yeah, for like. A while," Liam said, with half a shrug. He stood up then, and went over to the bay of monitors. “You could stop staring at me whenever, dude,” he said.

Theo’s cheeks wanted to go hot; another thing he did wrong on accident. He took a deep breath, steadied himself, and said, “I’m _looking_ at you. Because we’re having a conversation.”

“Can we get the cameras up here?” Liam asked, and Theo went over to help him because he was pretty certain he’d figure it out faster. Which, he did. No surprise there. The surprise was how Liam looked at him after and said, “You’re good at that.”

“At turning on a computer?” Theo said.

“No, at technology stuff. Figuring stuff out.”

“That’s just having a brain.”

That got under Liam’s skin, when nothing else had before. He huffed out a breath and crossed his arms. “I’m trying to actually give you a compliment,” he said. “If you’ll let me.” He looked over at Theo for a second, a glance Theo felt peripherally, and then looked back at the cameras. “Oh, they’re here.”

Theo didn’t really know what to do. He could manage to fake it with most of the time, except when it came to things like this. People things, not reading them or tricking them or getting something from them but where all that ended and you were talking with someone who knew you, somehow. He never seemed to know what to do with that. So, he stalled until Malia and Lydia were in here, and then he didn’t have to deal with it at all.

“This is better,” Lydia said with palpable relief as she walked in, and planted herself at the computers. She began typing quickly, pulling up apps that Theo didn’t recognize. _That_ was somebody actually good at computers, Theo observed. Everything he could do, someone else could do better around here. Something he really had to keep in mind; he was expendable.

Malia joined Lydia, for a second, looking between all the screens. Then she got bored and went over to see what food was in the fridge. She growled at Theo as she passed him, a sound that would probably be more frightening if she was shifted. And also maybe if she wasn’t a teenage girl with a fraying french braid in gross clothes. Moving the bodies in the sheriff’s station had stained her jeans and shirt with blood and other stuff. Though, for that matter, Theo wasn’t clean either. He needed to get some clothes out of his car. But there was no chance in hell that Corey would take him outside.

Scott and Kira were last in, with a visible Corey between them, and Scott shut and locked the door behind them. “Okay,” Scott said then. “We’ve gotta rest up until Stiles gets here.”

“Yeah, because once Stiles is here there won’t be any rest,” Theo said. He didn’t mean it to be just mean - it was definitely also true. And most of everyone found it funny. Except Corey, who kept glaring at Theo until he fell asleep on the couch. But Theo was pretty sure that Corey would be glaring at him in any room they shared until the end of time, so he didn’t pay any attention to it. He just noticed when Liam went over to talk to him because that meant Theo would be steering clear of Liam, too. Which was fine. Whatever. Theo stayed where he was and cast his eyes around for something else to focus on.

Scott made eye contact with Theo, and Scott didn’t glare at people but he also didn’t seem particularly happy to see him. “You good?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” Theo said, because that’s what Scott wanted to hear.

“Awesome. Is there anything good to eat, here?” Scott asked, raising his voice and looking past Theo at Malia.

Theo turned to follow Scott’s gaze, and found Malia sitting on the floor, in the open door of the fridge. “Some stuff,” Malia said. “Pretty good.” There was a beer on the floor in front of her, lid mangled but off, and she was about halfway through a box of Ritz crackers. So now there was blood and crumbs all over her clothes. Scott reached past her into the fridge, and pulled out a bottle of water, then started rummaging through the cabinets. “Dibs on the other couch,” Malia said to Scott.

“Not if I get there first,” Scott said with a little smile.

“Babe,” Lydia raised her voice.

“Huh,” Malia said.

“Change your clothes before you go to sleep. There should be extras in there.” Lydia pointed at a section of the wall that, on closer look, had handles inset.

“Roger that.” Malia crawled to her feet, and went over to where Lydia had pointed.

A new shirt would be nice. Theo followed, at a distance because he didn’t exactly want to be growled at again. It didn’t work; Malia felt him at her back and turned back with a furious glare. “You,” she said with disdain. “What are you doing?”

“Trying to get a shirt without some cop’s brains on it,” Theo said. “If that’s alright with you.”

“New shirts for non-traitors only,” Malia snapped.

“Malia,” Lydia said, without looking over.

“What!”

“Reformed traitors get shirts.”

Malia growled again, and Theo stared her down. “Fine,” Malia spat out after a second. “But stay where I can see you.”

It probably wouldn’t go over well, if Theo thanked Lydia for calling him reformed. Everything he did ended up coming out suspicious. But Theo did send her mental thanks, as he changed into a black T-shirt with no body fluids on it.

Theo didn’t really think about changing until he noticed Malia stripped down just as shamelessly as he did, her boobs just out there. Not that Theo was looking, of course. He wasn’t. Nobody was, actually. Corey was asleep and Scott was hunched over the sink eating and the other two girls were bickering about semantics.

“Terror is a better starting place,” Kira finished firmly.

“Fine,” Lydia said. “At least Isaac finally digitized the family archives. It’ll be easier to find any reference to the Anuk-Ite.”

“If those old white guys even got the name right,” Kira pointed out.

Lydia rolled her eyes, one of those blatantly fake-annoyed things she did so often. She liked Kira correcting her. “I’m not counting on it,” she said.

It was kind of a sweet moment. Or, it would be if Theo cared about things like that. He was just noticing, for no particular reason. But then he made eye contact with Liam, and Liam seemed to be drawing some kind of conclusion that made Theo uneasy.

“If you don’t stay reformed, I’ll ruin your shirt in a totally new way,” Malia threatened, but she was fumbling with an arm hole and the effect wasn’t really all that intimidating.

“Noted,” Theo said, and pulled on a crewneck too. It was cold in here, it was giving him the same bone-deep shivers as the Doctors’ lab. Then he went to sit in the only place available, at the shiny metal table that he suspected would also serve as an operating table if needed. The chairs were not comfortable.

“So who taught you to drive?” Liam asked, as he flopped into a chair next to Theo.

“No one.” Theo turned to face him. He noticed, from within his new crewneck, that Liam was in a T-shirt and appeared nothing but comfortable. Werewolf body temperature. Theo gave more information on accident. “I forged the paperwork my temps and taught myself. Why do you want to know?”

Liam shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t drive, so-“

“What?”

“What, what.”

“I don’t drive,” Liam repeated, like that explained anything. Theo gave him a look. “I don’t have my license! I mean, Mason always drives, so I just haven’t had to, like. Don’t act like this is crazy, tons of people don’t get their licenses right away.”

Theo frowned at him. “That’s not true.”

“How would you know?” Liam said. “You don’t know what’s normal. You’re kind of a freak.” He said it with some of a smile on his face, that was the confusing thing.

That was something Liam did sometimes, be suddenly, shockingly rude. Theo couldn’t tell if it was supposed to mean anything. By default he acted like it did, just in case. “Wow,” he said tightly, and looked away from Liam.

Malia was asleep, an arm and a leg hanging off the edge of the couch. As Theo looked, Scott cuddled up to sleep too, on the end she wasn’t using. The two of them were like siblings, the way that Scott was a little bit like everyone’s brother. Something in Theo’s chest ached, something close to his sister’s heart.

“What,” Liam said. It had been a few seconds of silence. “Is that not something I’m supposed to bring up?”

“Did I say that?” Theo said. He sounded testy even to himself.

“No, but. You don’t exactly say things, all the time,” Liam said. “Don’t you like being a freak, anyways? With the extra powers, and everything?”

Theo did pretend to like it, because it was better than admitting that all he wanted was to be a werewolf like the rest of them. The Doctors had been able to give him some of the perks, but not all of them. None of the instincts, nothing that would actually help him here. “Are you cold?” he asked without really thinking.

“No. Why, are you?”

“Why do you care who taught me to drive?” he asked, instead of answering.

Liam looked at him, or kept looking at him but his eyes changed somehow. There was something Theo was missing. “What did you think Kira did to you?” Liam asked.

It was an astonishing question. Theo deflected out of instinct. “I didn’t do much thinking, while I was there. Kind of busy being psychologically tortured.” Physically tortured too, as far as he knew, but.

“No, but after. When you were out.”

“When I was out, I was very glad to be out.” For whatever reason this was hard to talk about.

Liam kept just pressing. “Did you think it was real?”

It should’ve been easy enough to deny. Simple, succinct. _No._ But Liam leaned his elbows on the table, pressing his shoulder against Theo’s in the process, and somehow that complicated things. “I assumed,” Theo said, and hesitated. “I mean, it was basically exactly what…” What he deserved, maybe. What he thought was waiting.

A pretty terrifying power for someone to have. If Theo knew it was an option, he would’ve asked to be made a kitsune. But it probably wasn’t, he didn’t have the genetic thing.

“You know, you should probably talk about that with someone,” Liam said.

“Right,” Theo said. As if he had someone to talk to. Probably not a good idea to admit how Liam was one of the people he’d known longest in his life, given that they’d known each other for all of a year. And for part of that time, Theo had been trying to get Liam to kill Scott. If they were friends, it definitely started after that.

The bunker was quiet. Just the sounds of Kira and Lydia clicking and occasionally typing, and the subsonic buzz of wires in the walls that Theo’s powers let him hear. He fell asleep before he knew it, sitting in that hard chair. Woke up some time later, at some sort of sound. Liam was slumped against Theo’s side, passed out with his cheek smushed against the table and his shoulder pressing into Theo’s ribs.

“Shit,” Kira repeated, the sound that woke Theo up.

“Okay,” Lydia said. “Less than ideal.”

“That’s putting it lightly,” Kira said. Something happened, a soft hum grew briefly louder, and Theo looked over at a loud scraping sound to find Kira backing away from the computers quickly. “Shit,” she said again, and Theo thought he heard fear.

Lydia turned and made direct, purposeful eye contact with Theo. “Come here,” she said, which made him not want to just on principle. He was the kind of comfortable that would vanish the moment he moved, warm from Liam and not totally awake yet. But Lydia was the only person right more often than Mason, so Theo pushed Liam away and got up. Kira’s hands, he noticed as he took his first step, were covered in writhing currents. Theo didn’t need Lydia to tell him what to do anymore; he just stood in front of Kira and held his hands out.

“You have my powers?” Kira checked before reaching back. Her hair was starting to stand up. A white spark burned in the center of her pupils. All in all, not ideal around the Argents’ databases.

“Not all of them,” Theo said. He meant it as a joke.

Kira took it as the confirmation it was and took one of his hand in both of hers. In the process, she pulled him closer. The moment she touched him, he lost the ability to breathe for several long seconds. He was siphoning power off of her, huge amounts, and she kept generating more. It buzzed behind his eyeballs, in his teeth, and down every bone and then it was over. And Kira was just holding his hand in both of hers like a lifeline as she let out a deep breath. Theo took a deep breath. The air tasted like ozone, somehow crisper than before.

“Well,” Kira said then. “Okay. Thanks.”

“Any time. What’d you find?”

Kira looked past him, at Lydia. Right. They didn’t trust him.

“We found,” Lydia said, “that there are two of them. And we have to kill them both to actually stop them.”

“Two of the Anuk-Ite?” Theo repeated.

“Yeah,” Kira said, and took her hands away from Theo to run one through her hair. Theo flexed his fingers, trying to make them feel normal again. It was going to take a second.

Lydia took back over explaining, and Theo turned to listen. “You weren’t there for the alpha pack, but there were twins who got more powerful together. This is like that, and that almost killed Allison,” she finished, that last part was mostly to herself. She looked tired; Lydia rarely looked less than perfect.

Allison again. It was inconvenient that so much about this situation seemed to hinge on people Theo hadn’t gotten to meet. “Okay,” he said, with calculated confidence. “So we’ll have to be careful.”

“Yeah,” Lydia said. “Separate them, somehow.”

“Or overwhelm them,” Kira said, and gave Lydia a look with particular significance.

Lydia turned fully around in her chair and looked at Kira firmly. “I won’t ask her to come back,” she answered. “And I know Scott won’t, either.”

“Allison,” Theo said, to check.

Lydia nodded, sparing him a look. “You never met her. But you’d get along.”

That didn’t exactly compute. It took a second. Lydia was saying he’d get along with her best friend. Almost seemed like maybe she liked him. “Would we,” he said, sort of dumbly.

Lydia gave him a little smile, a satisfied one. She knew exactly what she was saying. “Yeah,” she said. “She’s a pragmatist.”

“Ice cold,” Kira translated.

And Lydia grinned. “Well.”

That was more of what he expected. “If she ever ends up back here, I hope I meet her,” Theo said. He even meant it, and let himself believe that they could tell. Kira thanked him for his help and sat back down. Lydia withdrew her attention to keep researching. So Theo went back to the table where Liam was still dozing with the goal of going back to sleep. There were still a few hours left, and Theo wanted to get all the rest he could. This was sounding like it was going to be a lot.

When he sat back down, Liam stirred, peeled his cheek off the table and squinted at Theo. “Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” Theo echoed.

“Are you okay?” Liam asked. His eyes looked closed.

It felt a strange sort of deja vu, to hear that. Maybe Theo was just still not totally awake. “I’m fine,” Theo said.

Liam, evidently, didn’t believe him. He hauled Theo’s chair closer by the leg, and then poked him. “Lie down,” he said a couple times, until Theo leaned his arms on the table and pretended to put his head down and did not point out that that wasn’t lying down. Then Liam slipped one arm through one of Theo’s, tucked his hand in the crook of Theo’s arm and put his head down on Theo’s shoulder. And just like that, Liam was asleep again. So, whatever. Theo kept his head down and fell back asleep too.

Stiles got there with a bang. Literally. The bang of the door hitting the wall as Stiles burst in with way too much energy for it being like seven in the morning. Theo startled upright, and Liam slid off his shoulder so suddenly his forehead hit the table. He woke up too, sitting straighter and rubbing his eyes.

“Alright, losers, I’m here to save your asses,” Stiles said. Definitely a line he prepared on the flight, judging from Derek’s exasperated eye-roll. The effect was sort of ruined by how Stiles dropped everything to go pull Lydia to her feet and hug her. “Hey,” he said then, quieter. “That was a joke.”

Lydia’s voice was very muffled, but Theo could still mostly make it out. “I knew that was a joke, moron.” She was holding onto him tightly, so tightly it was hard to look at.

It was a moment, and then everyone woke up within like a minute of each other and there was sort of a whirlwind of hugs and catching up and planning that Theo was present for but didn’t really participate in. He and Derek exchanged a nod, sure. Stiles didn’t totally ignore his presence on purpose as much as all of his attention was on Scott and Lydia and Malia and Kira. He was even excited to see Liam. And Theo found himself in the unenviable position of feeling sympathetic to Corey. The other outsider in this tight-knit group. Though, Corey would probably be pissed if he knew Theo was thinking like that.

“Wait, though,” Stiles said halfway through Scott and Kira’s explanation. They were all standing around the table now. Theo was leaning against the wall, behind everyone else. “So you’ve figured out the fear monster thing, the being made of pure terror. Great. Standard fare. We’ll have it under control. But what’s this Monroe lady’s deal?”

“Guidance counselor,” Liam said helpfully. Theo rolled his eyes.

“Okay…” Stiles frowned. “Great, I guess, but why’s she after you guys? Is she a hunter?”

Malia and Lydia exchanged a look. “That would make sense,” Malia said.

“Well don’t sound so surprised about it,” Stiles said, immediately sidetracked by her tone. “I routinely make sense. In fact, I have a job that might sort of revolve around it.”

“Not the point,” Derek said, arms crossed. He addressed Scott. “Did you ask Chris if he knew who she was?” 

“Well, not exactly.”

Derek and Stiles frowned in unison. “You talked to him, though, right?” Stiles said. “I mean, he had to let you in here, I know he’s got a system in here out of Mission Impossible. Except better, because they always figure out a way past those.”

“Of course they do,” Kira said. “Or there wouldn’t be any movies. It’s a plot function, not a statement on the security of the-”

“Yes, we talked to him,” Scott said on top of her. He hugged her close, as consolation, and Kira smiled. “But we didn’t know we were supposed to ask about Monroe being a hunter, because she seems like she could also just be a pretty normal awful person. You know?”

Stiles nodded in a way that disagreed whole-heartedly, and looked at Lydia. “Where were you?” he demanded. “When they were deciding to not investigate her.”

“Hey,” Malia said in a warning tone. It was sweet, especially since Lydia definitely did not need to be protected.

“Figuring out how to kill the supernatural threat, if that’s okay with you,” Lydia snapped back. “There’s a sometimes invisible creature instilling primal terror in anyone near it - forgive me for thinking the bigots were the B-plot.” Her words rang in the air after she finished speaking and Theo remembered all over again, the way he kept remembering, that Lydia was someone nobody wanted to start shouting.

“It is the B-plot,” Kira said to Stiles, a hint of a smile on her face. “You’re the pre-climax twist solving it.”

That was something Stiles was open to. He made a series of faces, considering it, and finally nodded. “Fair enough. Did Isaac get around to scanning the histories?”

“They’re in, but not sorted or tagged,” Lydia answered.

Stiles nodded several times, cracked his neck and shook out his hands. Cockiness he was putting on, but it looked so natural Theo couldn’t tell if it was really fake. “Okay,” Stiles said. “Let’s get into some database management.”

There was a brief awkward pause. “Exciting climax,” Derek said flatly.

“You can go do pushups if you want to,” Stiles told him without looking at him. “Or stand in another circle and do more planning that doesn’t go anywhere. It’s entirely up to you.”

Lydia rolled her eyes. “You can _not_ use a Sorkinism and pretend that’s a way a normal person interacts with the world.”

“I usually get away with it,” Stiles said. “The only TV show Derek’s ever seen is Top Gear.”

“Oh my God?” Kira said, with what seemed like genuine surprise.

This was more than Derek was going to put up with. He threw his arms out dramatically. “That’s not _true._ But, I _have_ been a little busy, if you hadn’t noticed. Saving all your asses, before you knew what werewolves were, for starters.” And that was all well and good but Theo had just connected some dots.

“Wait,” Theo said. “Chris is Chris Argent?”

“Yeah…” Scott answered hesitantly with a frown.

Theo looked at Derek in particular. “Your best friend is a hunter?”

“He’s not my best friend,” Derek said crossly, over the giggles of basically everyone else in the room. That just pissed him off more; he glared around at everyone, generally. “He’s not!”

“Follow up question,” Stiles said, deceptively mild. “Who is, then? If not Chris Argent, an old man who attempted to kill you. Who is your best friend, Derek?” Liam snorted at that, which Stiles was delighted by; he gave Liam a warm kind of smile that Theo noticed. He just noticed.

Derek seethed, silently, but had no comeback that was any good. “I don’t _have_ a best friend,” he grumbled, and stalked off. No one seemed convinced by that - that was probably why he fled.

“Well, now I’m offended,” Stiles said to Theo. “So. Thanks for that.”

It didn’t seem exactly fair, to blame Theo. That did not seem like a conclusion he should be expected to draw. But Stiles wasn’t also really mad about it; Theo had pissed him off enough before to be sure. So Theo just smirked, and said, “No problem,” and let Stiles move on.

The dork squad - Stiles, Lydia, Kira - went back to the computers. Scott went with them. No surprise there; they were his favorite people, and Derek was doing something in the gun corner.

“You missed a lot of stuff, huh,” Liam said to Theo. “While you were being evil.”

This again. Theo let out a deep sigh through his nose and shook his head before working up some kind of response. “Alright,” he finally said. “That card again.”

“That card,” Liam agreed. “Almost like it’s not something we can forget. The way you tried to convince me to kill Scott, for example.”

It was hard to have anything to say in response; Theo just took a deep breath and thought. Seriously thought with no exact goal in mind. Liam kept bringing this up, and Theo was just about out of calm responses. “I’m not asking you to forget,” he said, once he was sure he could sound normal about it. “But you’ve gotta accept an apology at some point, or shut up about it. Can we put that on the table?”

Liam raised his eyebrows at him. “Oh,” he said. It was unclear how he meant that; his face was impassive. Theo spent several long moments thinking he might’ve said the exact wrong thing, somehow, again. Maybe Liam just wanted to be angry forever. That was fine. And probably fair. “Yeah,” Liam finally said. “We can.”

“Okay,” Theo managed. “Alright. Good.”

“So are you going to apologize, or what?” Liam said after a pause. There was a sort of confrontational glint in his eye.

“Have I not, already?” Theo said, and he knew he was teasing now.

“You haven’t. It must’ve slipped your mind. Since you were doing so much scheming,” Liam suggested politely, and Theo was confident he was being teased back.

“I’ll have to get it on the schedule,” Theo said.

Malia was over here too still, watching them talk. At this moment she wasn’t glaring at Theo. He couldn’t quite read her either. “So does this mean you’re done trying to manipulate all of us into giving you power?” she said.

That was definitely not teasing. Theo opened his mouth and shut it again. He shouldn’t lie. “Probably,” he said. It didn’t sound like a joke the way it did with Liam. He wanted it to be a joke.

“Well, that’s an improvement,” Liam said after a moment.

And before Theo could tell how to take it, Malia said loudly, “There’s another room?” and bounded off after Derek. Derek, who had opened a door none of them had seen and was currently going down some stairs.

Theo and Liam exchanged a look, and silently agreed to head down too. Liam went first, and Theo followed close. A trap wasn’t likely, but Theo was on edge. The stairs were dark.

“What the hell is this?” Malia was saying from the bottom, out of sight, and a light turned on just as the boys got down there with her.

It was several more rooms. First, a large storeroom, the shelves stacked with crates and weapons and shit. Past that, a door that Derek and Malia were going through. Liam followed, so of course Theo followed too. On the other side of the door was a very nice apartment. They walked into the living room area, more couches and chairs and a TV. There was a full kitchen down here, and a hallway that Derek was disappearing down. “This is the actual safe house,” he said over his shoulder.

“Who has a decoy safe house inside their safe house?” Malia demanded. She was looking at everything, close and curious and hungry.

“Chris does,” Derek said, head popping back out of a doorway. “Of course. Now listen.” He fixed them with a very stern look. “Stiles was talking the whole flight. I’m going to sleep. They’ll come get me if we’re going somewhere. Otherwise, if anyone wakes me up I’ll take their arm off.”

Liam seemed actually worried about that. “Oh,” he said. 

“I want to sleep,” Malia said. “Can I sleep? Are there beds?”

Derek gave her a stern glare, and pointed. “Silent,” he said firmly. “I mean it.”

Malia snapped at him, like actually snapped her teeth. Derek just rolled his eyes, and stepped back so she could squeeze past him through the door. He looked at Theo and Liam then. “Did you call my uncle?”

“No,” Liam shook his head.

“Ew,” Malia’s voice came from inside the room. “Do we have to?”

“Well, he’s a murderer so he’d probably be pretty useful, here,” Derek told her, and got no further argument. He looked back at Liam, and then at Theo. “Tell Scott. We need him.”

Liam nodded, so Derek went into the bedroom and shut the door. There was a beat of silence.

“Do arms regenerate?” Liam asked.

“I think he was joking.”

“No, I know, I just don’t know what would happen if he actually took one of our arms off.”

“Why are you asking me?”

Liam looked up at him, his eyes somehow lighter than usual. “Well, you’re the one who was apparently raised by some mad scientist dudes, so. I figured you’d have an idea.”

“They didn’t raise me,” Theo said reflexively, and then regretted it because that was too obvious. Liam quirked an eyebrow up. “But that’s a fair point,” Theo said, to distract him. “I don’t know. They didn’t really experiment on werewolves that much. Sort of all in on the chimera thing.”

That got Liam to laugh a little. “Okay,” he said. “Well, do you want to go back upstairs and help them figure things out?”

They wouldn’t accept Theo’s help even if he offered it, but Theo didn’t want to tell Liam that if that had somehow escaped his attention. “Uh,” Theo began, and then Corey came down the stairs and joined them.

Corey began, of course, with a glare at Theo. “This is more of the safe house?” he asked Liam specifically.

“Yeah,” Liam said. He squinted for a second at Corey, and then glanced at Theo and shifted a step closer. “There’s bedrooms, I guess, if you’re still tired.”

No need to hang around and wait to hear whatever Corey had to say; Theo knew better than to stay where he wasn’t wanted. He made for the stairs. At least Stiles’ hatred had a familiar shape to it, something he could get his hands around. Theo was two up when he realized Liam was right behind him. He turned around and Liam was right there on the step beneath him, shorter than ever and looking Theo in the eye. “What are you doing?” Theo asked after a second where his brain was just static.

“It’s never going to get better if you just keep avoiding him,” Liam said.

“Okay. So you’re following me, why?” Theo demanded.

“Because I’m not letting you avoid me too,” Liam said. “And maybe I know some stuff. She was my guidance counselor for a year.”

That was news. “A year?” Theo repeated. “She didn’t just come in this year?”

“No, she was here last year too. Maybe longer, I don’t know.”

Right. Liam was only a sophomore.

This probably wasn’t news to anyone else. It had probably already occurred to Stiles, but now Theo was thinking he should go at least listen as they tried to figure this out because this thing was feeling weird. So he turned to go up the stairs and then paused, and turned back. It took a second, to work up the nerve to speak. He opened and shut his mouth. Liam watched, with a smile back on his face.

It was a few more seconds than that, actually. “You think it could get better with him?” he finally asked. Still not sure he wanted to hear the answer.

“I think it sort of has to, at some point,” Liam answered, his smile just growing brighter. “Since you’re basically at rock bottom, now.” And then he leaned closer, he put his hand on Theo’s arm and said with genuine concern, “Hey, if you’re really upset-“

“I’m not,” Theo cut him off. His ears were burning.

“Okay, but, if you were.”

Theo glared at him. “Oh, that got me. Great job. You’ve fooled me with your cunning wordplay.”

“Shut up. It works sometimes.”

If Theo kept looking at him any longer, it felt like he’d do something truly stupid like blush or tell Liam to finish his sentence. So he went the rest of the way back up the steps and felt Liam right behind him and didn’t say anything.

“If we tag as we go it’ll save us time later, that’s all I’m saying,” Lydia said. “Minor sacrifice in exchange for-“

“Sure, save ourselves a few hours in the future when time is of the essence now. No big deal,” Stiles echoed. He was scrolling, his back in a truly unwise curve as he scanned the screen. Lydia was sitting next to him, one cheek smushed where it rested on her hand.And Kira and Scott were sharing a chair, holding each other and watching their friends bicker with soft little smiles on their faces. It was sweet. It made Theo’s stomach flip.

“Hey guys,” Liam said, which ruined how Theo meant to lurk. Everyone turned to look at them. “Derek said to tell you you should call Peter.”

Scott dropped his head onto Kira’s shoulder. Stiles let out one short laugh. Lydia groaned loudly. “In-laws,” Stiles said to her sympathetically. “I get it. Well, I don’t _get_ it, but-”

“He’s your in-law too,” Lydia said ominously.

“Not technically. Not yet. Thank God.”

“Wait, so he just moved with you as a friend?” Kira said.

Stiles whipped his head around to glare at her. “Excuse me,” he said. “You’re the one who said it would be totally gross because he’s, and I quote, basically old enough to be my dad. And I’m quoting you so you can hear how stupid that sounds.”

“It doesn’t sound stupid,” Lydia said. “It sounds like she was giving you good advice.”

“He moved,” Scott said, in a desperate attempt to get some control of the conversation, “to keep Stiles safe. Since he usually attracts the most trouble.”

“Sure,” Kira said. “But why’d he volunteer? You know?” Theo saw the glint in her eye, the delight at causing problems on purpose, and hoped nobody else forgot she was a fox spirit probably a billion times more powerful than anyone else in the room. Even if she was sitting in Scott’s lap.

Well, maybe not more powerful than Scott. Maybe they’d know for sure if Scott actually used his one-in-a-generation powers for anything besides making everybody get along. He was the most powerful babysitter on earth, basically, and somehow seemed like that’s all he wanted. Stupid. Theo sometimes couldn’t handle looking at him.

“Guys,” Liam said, cutting off the argument that was still continuing. “Peter.”

“I don’t want to call Peter,” Scott said.

“It’s not a bad idea,” Stiles said, returning his attention to the computer screen.

“It really isn’t,” Lydia agreed. “He’s annoyingly great at scheming. And fighting. And we can be pretty sure he won’t betray us, since Malia would stop talking to him and possibly attempt to kill him. He’s also probably hiding right now, so. Not like he’s doing anything better.”

These were all good points, points Theo would make if anyone had asked him. It was probably good that Lydia made those points, thought, because they actually listened to her. Scott called Peter. Whatever. Theo didn’t pay a ton of attention. He went to sit on the now-empty couches, and fell asleep basically immediately, on accident, so. He missed most of it.

He dreamed about hell. Or not hell, but wherever he’d been. What he thought hell would be. Wherever his sister waited in his subconscious, ready to claw her heart out and reunite it with its original body. He woke with a jolt that Scott and Liam noticed, and reminded himself to slow his heartbeat. Werewolf senses.

Knowing he should do it and being able to were two different things. Theo shut his eyes again, briefly, and listened to the rest of the room.

“So if it’s the same guy, that means she’s French,” Stiles said. “Seems like a bit of a coincident.”

“The kind of coincident I don’t believe in,” Lydia said. “I’m calling Isaac, they have the old records there.”

Liam looked at Theo pointedly, jerked his head at the door and raised his eyebrows which Theo took as a suggestion to go back downstairs. He shrugged, so they went. Theo first on the steps, Liam at his back.

“Hungry?” Liam asked.

“Probably not as hungry as you,” Theo said, instead of saying yes.

“What do you mean?”

“Your metabolism, the healing. I don’t have the full…” Theo was the one who had brought this up, but he was regretting it. “Mine’s different,” he finished eventually. “I don’t need to eat as much as you guys.”

“How much do we need to eat?” Liam asked.

This had been something the Doctors studied. Theo tried to remember. “Something like double normal? Four to six thousand calories a day? More if you’re injured. I’m not sure.”

“Cool that you know all that,” Liam said, and led Theo to the kitchen area. “What do you want to eat?”

“I don’t think we have a ton of options,” Theo said, and began to pull open some cabinets. Lots of boxes of shit like granola bars, and cans of various vegetables. “Considering that it all has to be shelf-stable enough to survive a nuclear war, or whatever,” Theo continued, half to himself. Then what Liam said had caught up to him. “And stop that.”

“Stop what?”

“Complimenting me.”

Liam snorted at him. “Okay, weirdo,” he said sarcastically. Not taking it seriously.

“I’m serious. I don’t need… that.”

“You don’t need me to… what, say nice things?”

Yes, but it sounded dumb like that. Theo found a thing of peanut butter and graham crackers and figured he’d settle for that; he watched Liam unwrap a granola bar and shove it in his mouth.

Theo opened the sealed peanut butter, tore into the graham crackers, and altogether attempted to ignore the question. But it didn’t work like that with Liam, of course. It never seemed to. Pleasantly, Liam pushed it once he was finished chewing. “Of course you do, dude,” he said, with kindness that sounded a lot like Scott.

“I think I’d know,” Theo said testily.

“Maybe if you were good at emotional stuff at all, you’d have some kind of idea but.”

Theo raised his eyebrows. “Uh, excuse me?” he demanded.

“What?” Liam opened another granola bar, and took a bite that was half of it. The first few chews sounded painful. “Is that controversial?” he said, once his mouth wasn’t full.

It took several seconds to try and come up with a response. Because, like. No. Not controversial. It was just the sort of the principle of the matter, of Liam knowing him well enough to say something like _if you were good at emotional stuff at all_ and both of them knowing that Theo wasn’t, in fact. That felt kind of unbearable. “That’s one way to say wrong, yeah,” Theo said in the end, trying for careless and ending up annoyed.

Liam was just watching him. “You know I’ve been to a ton of therapy, right?” he said.

“Yeah…”

“That’s the kind of thing you could say, if you wanted to.”

Theo frowned at him. His mouth suddenly felt gummy, and not from the peanut butter. “I’m sorry, are you teaching me how to bully you?”

“Yeah,” Liam admitted cheerfully.

“I don’t need that. I know how to-”

“Are you sure?” Liam’s eyes were still on his face.

“Yes! Yes I’m sure. What are you talking about?”

Liam finished his granola bar while Theo was speaking and picked up a third. “I’m not gonna be mad,” he finally said. “I can tell when you’re joking. Even though you’re not great at it.”

“Fuck you,” Theo said crossly. And Liam just grinned, and shrugged, and unwrapped his third granola bar.

The hell did he know anyways. Theo was fucking great at comebacks with people he didn’t sort of try to kill in the last year. That was really the main thing. He wasn’t interested in reminding these people how he tried and failed to manipulate them with personal information. Safer to not admit he knew any personal information whatsoever, and to not let himself be goaded into anything.

Okay maybe that last bit was a little too hopeful. Theo screwed the lid on the peanut butter, he put what was left of the graham crackers back in the box and shut it up again, and then when he ran out of things to pretend to pay attention to, he said, “If I wanted to I could-“

“Do it,” Liam shrugged.

“I don’t want to.”

“You don’t want to be funny?”

In the following silence, Theo fought two equally strong impulses. The first was to bully Liam to the point of tears just to prove that he could - definitely a stupid idea and not helpful and overall, bad. The second instinct was to tell him the truth, and that was almost as bad.

“Do you think we should call Hayden?” Liam asked apropos of nothing. “If we need more people.”

That was kind of a non sequitur. “Uh,” Theo frowned. “Why would we do that?”

“Because she’s a werewolf?” Liam pointed out. “Because we need more people on our side, and like. She’d probably come back if I asked her.” He heaved a deep sigh. “I mean obviously, I still have her number and stuff.”

“No one’s making you call your ex-girlfriend,” Theo said. “So if you do that, it’s all on you. But. I don’t think you should.”

“Why?”

“Because.”

“You can’t just say because.”

He could, but Liam’s dumb logic was somehow convincing. So Theo looked him in the eye and answered. “I’m glad she left, because she was my… like.”

“In your pack,” Liam said for him.

“Right. And she’s the only one left. So. I’m glad she’s not here,” Theo said, and put the boxes back in the shelf.

Liam was staring at him, when he turned back around. It seemed like Liam stared at him a lot, actually. For someone who complained about Theo looking at him too much. “What?” Theo demanded irritably.

“Nothing.”

“Not nothing, why are you looking at me?”

“Is that your way of saying you want her to be safe?”

The only reason Theo glared at him was because Liam seemed to think he was getting something over on him. “Contrary to what all you goody two-shoes think, yes, I do want people to be safe,” Theo said crossly.

Liam raised his eyebrows with a bit of a smirk. “Interesting,” he said. “Do you want us to be safe?”

“Obviously, since I’m here with you.”

“You know what I mean,” Liam said.

The obnoxious thing was that Theo did know, but he didn’t want to say anything about it. “I definitely don’t,” he lied, and went for the door. It was claustrophobic down here.

“Yes you do, come on,” Liam insisted. He grabbed Theo as he passed, by the arm. That was all the excuse Theo needed to lean in, take Liam by the shoulder, and flip him flat onto the floor.

The thump of skull against concrete sounded like a concussion. Theo paused, his hand still on Liam’s shoulder. His mouth was dry. “Took you long enough,” Liam finally coughed out, and put a hand over his stomach as he tried to inhale. The wind was knocked out of him.

It took a second to process the feeling Theo was having. He sort of… felt bad. “Instinct,” Theo said, and meant to add, _sorry_.

“You have some messed up instincts.”

“Well, I was kind of raised by some mad scientists, so,” Theo said, and that made Liam light up. Theo pulled him back up to his feet, and thought about the way Liam gave him his hand. Easily. And didn’t take it back, didn’t act like Theo was dangerous. For a second they were standing and holding hands.

“Your heart’s like, super loud right now,” Liam said.

Again, Theo was saved by something happening around them. This time, it was a song blaring. Not quite loud to his ears, but enough to make Liam scrunch his nose up and look up towards the ceiling. He dropped Theo’s hand, too. “What is that?” Theo said.

“The Barbie girl song?” Liam said, which sounded like nonsense.

Whatever it was, Derek came storming down the hall and past them towards the stairs with an impressive glare. They followed him, just made it to the top of the steps when the song stopped. “It got your attention, didn’t it,” Stiles said, extremely unrepentant.

“A lot of things get my attention,” Derek began.

“Well, this is a big one, so buckle up.”

“She’s an Argent,” Lydia said, and after that it was all planning again.

Monroe was not her real name, that was the long and short of it. Or, not the only name in her family. Her grandfather on her mother’s side had been an Argent.

That explained a lot of things.

Phone calls with made in a flurry, calling in every favor. Not Hayden, though. Liam didn’t call Hayden. Theo noticed it without totally meaning to. Everyone else was called, though, and the plan formulated.

It was simple. Anuk-ite first, bigots second, after they weren’t being juiced up by extra fear. Chris Argent would be coming back for that, but it’d be a little while. So the Anuk-Ite. Two kanimas, two halves of the fear monster. Their first team, including Jackson, would sneak up and paralyze one half of the Anuk-Ite. Then they’d bait the other half to where the second team was. Separate them, kill it. Theo would be in the second team. “It would be great,” Stiles said in a tone that didn’t seem hopeful, “if you could paralyze the second half too. Way easier to hit a paralyzed target.”

“Yeah, I can do that,” Theo said.

Stiles didn’t seem to believe him. “Okay. Great. And in case you don’t, I’ll come.”

“Good idea. Bring your aluminum baseball bat,” Theo said sarcastically.

“I’ll bring several,” Stiles said.

“I’ll come too,” Liam said, and no one told him not to.

The teams, as they were, ended up like this: Scott and Derek and Jackson were team one, heading out first to do some paralyzing. Malia and Peter and Corey out causing problems for Monroe and her people. Parrish and Sheriff Stilinski would cover for them. Stiles and Theo and Liam and Lydia were team two. So, with all that sorted out, they had about twelve hours to stay hidden before this would all kick off. Jackson had to get here, and Peter had to drive back from wherever he’d escaped to weeks ago.

There was then some serious fighting over beds. The bunker had a total of four bunk beds and a queen, and as everyone trooped downstairs it seemed like Lydia and Malia were going to share the queen, and that the boys and Kira would have to argue over top and bottom bunks. “You haven’t slept in a full day,” Malia told Lydia, her hands on Lydia’s shoulders as she walked her towards the steps.

“Neither has Stiles,” Lydia mumbled, which made Stiles say something from the bottom of the stairs that had everyone laughing.

Theo just watched from the couch. He could use some distance from all of them. It was a lot, being around everyone, and would continue to be a lot. He needed to fucking recharge. Get some sleep without being surrounded by this pack that wasn’t his.

Like his words had fucking summoned him, Corey climbed the last few steps. His face fell when he saw Theo - normal for them, still annoying. But Corey set his jaw and kept walking, and came over to sit on the opposite couch.

“Hi,” Theo said.

“I heard what you said,” Corey said, and Theo’s blood went cold. “About Hayden.”

Okay. That was maybe not awful. Theo waited.

Corey had to work himself up to finish the sentence. “I didn’t know you felt like that,” he finally said. “I didn’t know you felt anything, actually.”

“Harsh but fair,” Theo said, and Corey almost smiled.

“So what changed your mind?” Corey asked.

It was a stupid question, but Theo couldn’t bullshit him. Not Corey, out of everyone. And everyone else was downstairs. So Theo let himself go down that road, and he worked up an answer. “Okay,” he said slowly. “Nothing, really. If I’m being honest. Not one thing. But. A couple of them.”

“Like what?”

“Like…” Only one word occurred to Theo as an answer; Liam. Because at the center of everything, every moment of Scott starting to trust him again and letting him prove himself, Liam was there. Pushing for Theo, making his case, doing so many stupid and kind things that Theo couldn’t really help but try and save his life, in the end. It was only fair, and Liam didn’t seem to know to ask for it so Theo had to give it to him.

“Look,” Theo said after all that went through his head, because he couldn’t say what was really true after all. “I don’t expect any of you to trust me again. Especially you. But I’m here because I want to be. Even if that means probably dying facing down some faceless two-headed thing.”

Corey started to answer, but then they heard someone on the steps and both turned to look. It was Liam, mid-yawn. He froze when he saw them. “Hey,” he said, and then shut his mouth.

“Hi,” Theo said. It came out sternly, somehow.

“All good?” Liam asked.

“Yes.”

“Yeah,” Corey said. “Is there a free bed?”

Liam got started walking again, coming towards them. “Oh, yeah. You can take it if you want. Stiles and Derek are done arguing, so you might even actually get some time to sleep.” He walked with a little bit of a hesitation, or maybe sleepiness, moving awkwardly. Theo was watching him, he realized belatedly after noticing all of that, and Liam could see him doing it. But Liam didn’t comment on it.

Corey got up as Liam drew closer, and went to walk away but he paused. His indecision was visible, but he did turn back in the end and looked at Theo one last time. “I wouldn’t be happy. If you died,” Corey said, and headed for the stairs.

Liam watched him go. “Kinda weird thing to say.”

“That was things getting better,” Theo said.

The smile on Liam’s face was bright and wide. “Good,” he said. And then with two full couches of space, Liam sat right next to Theo. Barely not touching. “You don’t want a bed?” he asked.

“I can sleep anywhere.”

“Like in your truck, maybe?” Liam said innocently, and Theo turned to look at him. He’d be afraid of the question, if it was anyone else asking. “Saw your toothbrush,” Liam added, and that almost sounded apologetic.

“God damn it,” Theo sighed, and settled into the corner of the couch. Slightly further away from Liam.“I’m fine. And we don’t need to talk about this.”

“I feel like living in your car is one thing we actually probably should talk about,” Liam said, and leaned on the back of the couch. Sort of leaned closer, actually. “You don’t have anywhere else to go?”

“Sure, rub it in.”

He knew how Liam talked most of the time; even when Liam said something unexpected it rarely broke the patterns Theo had worked out for him. Now, Liam should either double down on the rudeness or get jokingly apologetic. Maybe make the kind of unsubtle dig that would make Theo want to actually open up. But instead of all of that, Liam just blinked at him. Sleepily.

“It’s a long story,” Theo tried again. “Don’t worry.”

Liam didn’t say anything, which probably meant he wasn’t going to drop it, and all of a sudden the moment between them was charged. This was exactly when Theo had the least idea what to do, but he wanted to figure it out with a desperation he could taste. Theo’s need to know if he _was_ forgiven felt physical. A pull.

"You could say something now," Theo found himself saying, need coming out sharp and mean. "Or you could just keep looking at me like that, I guess."

That earned him a frown, a stormy look that promised a fight for a fraction of a second before it cooled off into routine annoyance. "Please," Liam said with an audible eye roll, which was less of an answer than saying nothing at all.

"Pretty stupid look on your face," Theo couldn't keep himself from saying. Needling, because every second of uncertainty was making it harder to breathe.

It didn't work, though. Liam, whose whole deal was that he was a fucking bomb ready to go off at any moment, wasn't anywhere near mad. Actually, he didn't even look annoyed anymore either. "Can you relax?" he said, and went to dig his knuckles in his eyes. Like he trusted that he could shut his eyes without Theo attacking him. Which he shouldn’t, or maybe he should just _say_ it, or maybe Theo should be the one asking if that’s what it meant. It was enough to make Theo want to explode just so someone did, slam Liam onto the floor or into a wall or maybe just against the couch. All for the few seconds after impact where he was holding Liam there, and Liam was letting him, and Theo had an actual handle on things.

Liam knocked the back of his hand against Theo’s leg. “Hey,” he said. “You want me to leave you alone? Is that why you’re trying to pick a fight?”

“No,” Theo said. He couldn’t look at Liam; he was sure it would show on his face, how much he didn’t know what to do.

“What _do_ you want, then,” Liam asked.

Theo couldn’t say he didn’t want anything, obviously he did. But he also couldn’t articulate what exactly he was after. Maybe he was bad at wanting things that he could actually have. Then again, who was to say he got to have Liam at all? And like, since when did he want that? It took a second, to get through this confusion to what was actually true, at the center of it. It had been true for long enough that it was hard to figure it out, but Theo's first priority had been Liam since Liam had pulled him out of hell. And now, he just had no idea where to go from here. In his heart - his sister’s heart - there was a delicate thought he could barely handle looking directly at, the idea that maybe Liam did all that shit for him because he liked Theo. Somehow. Despite everything that had happened last year. That was immediately suffocated by the larger, more likely thought that Liam was doing this out of something gross like pity or compassion. That was probably what was happening. These teacher's pet types loved a sympathy project.

"To go to sleep," Theo answered after a silence that was definitely long enough to be suspicious.

Liam rolled his eyes again. "Okay." He threw himself backwards, flopping down on his back on the couch, and then worked his shoes off. One almost hit Theo in the face. Stubbornly, Theo stayed where he was while Liam got comfortable even though it meant Liam kicking him three times. "Are all chimeras allergic to talking about their feelings, or did I just get lucky?" Liam mumbled, and fell asleep not even thirty seconds later. And Theo was left just looking at Liam, at his dumb sleeping face, and thinking about all the possible ways Liam could've meant that.

Sleep was a relief. Waking up was a disappointment. Or it was, until he realized that Liam had ended up with a foot between Theo's hip and the back of the couch, and then Theo opened his eyes to find Malia staring at him. He startled at the unexpected confrontation. "Jesus." Malia was sitting on the back of the other couch, eating jerky in a threatening way.

"This sucks," Malia said.

"Okay..."

This was not the response she was looking for. Malia looked across the room. Theo rubbed his eyes, in an effort to wake up faster. And, while Malia wasn't watching, he glanced over at Liam. Liam was still asleep, curled up towards the back of the couch. His foot was warm.

Lydia walked briskly over and sat on the couch next to Malia's feet. "What, babe," she said, with a glance at Theo that made him sit up straighter.

"This sucks," Malia said again, and Lydia made a sympathetic face.

"You can't choose family.”

"Scott literally can, and..." Malia made a motion that seemed to mean something derogatory about Scott's choices. "Here we are with a traitor and my stupid sperm donor."

Lydia made a face at the same time Theo did. “You’ve gotta let the traitor thing go,” she said to Malia. “Just to be practical. For example, I’m over how Peter bit me.”

“You should not be over that,” Malia frowned.

“It made more sense than turning down an ally,” Lydia shrugged. “Especially after how supportive he was when we came out.”

“We didn’t need him,” Malia grumbled. “I could’ve done all of that threatening just as well.”

Lydia continue over her. “If you can’t forgive, you’ve at least got to ignore it.”

“But he doesn’t know how to apologize.” Malia gestured at Theo. “So I don’t have any chance to forgive anybody.”

Lydia looked at Malia, and even just the half of her face Theo could see looked in love. “Sit on the floor,” Lydia said. “Let me fix your hair.” Malia hopped up and flopped down on the floor between Lydia’s legs, jerky still in hand. Lydia pulled out Malia’s hair tie, and began to redo her braid.

Theo had no idea why he was here, until Lydia looked him in the eye and said, “Well?”

“What?”

“You’re not stupid,” she said. “You know what.”

He did know what, even if the why was sort of escaping him. But if he needed to make some signs of submission to make Lydia feel good, so be it. “I’m sorry,” he said to Malia.

“For what?” Malia asked with her mouth full. She made a face, as Lydia tugged at her hair.

“For selling you out to your mom-“

“Not my mom,” Malia interjected.

“-and getting you shot, and anything else you’re mad about.”

Malia stared at him for several long second. He matched her gaze. And eventually she blinked. “Okay,” she said. "Cool."

"Cool," Theo repeated. "As in that's it?"

"Yeah," Malia said, and took another firm bite of jerky.

That didn't make any sense. Theo looked from her to Lydia; Lydia always knew what was going on. "Seriously?" he said.

"Please don't tell me you were so busy self-flagellating that you didn't realize that everyone else was forgiving you," Lydia said, her attention firmly on Malia's hair. The braid she was building was crisp and clean.

Theo just watched. Even in his wildest dreams, he never thought he was going to get forgiveness. Toleration, maybe. So this felt like the kind of thing he could ruin by breathing wrong. “Uh,” he managed. Very articulate.

“To be clear, I don’t forgive you,” Malia said. “But Scott said no killing so. I’m over it.”

“You’re over it,” Theo repeated, at a total loss.

Liam stirred then, stretched into Theo’s space and then pushed himself up on one arm. “Hey,” he said to Theo.

“Hi,” Theo said stiffly.

With that, Liam flopped back down on his stomach and apparently went back to sleep again. So then all Theo had to deal with was Lydia saying he was forgiven. “I don’t think everyone’s got the memo,” Theo finally answered her.

“Oh, they’ve got it,” Lydia said mildly. “Scott wouldn’t let them ignore it.”

“Scott,” Theo repeated.

“He claimed you as part of the pack, so.”

“When the fuck did he do that?”

Lydia poked Malia and Malia answered. “I don’t know. When did you kill a Ghost Rider?”

“Last year?” Theo demanded. “When you specifically told me I wasn’t part of the-“

“I was mad,” Malia said neutrally.

Theo frowned at her and then at Lydia, and all Lydia did was smile. A tight little smile, the kind of smile that was trying very hard not to be amused.

“Well. I guess I’m glad it’s in the past tense now,” Theo said, grasping at straws.

“For now,” Malia said, which for the first time seemed like the kind of friendly teasing Theo had learned to be okay with.

Liam moved again, didn’t quite sit up but laboriously turned himself around and flopped into a vaguely seated position leaning against Theo’s side. All at once, no hesitation, no consideration for the way that made Theo’s breath seize in his chest. “You really dragged that out, huh,” he said, and it took a moment to realize he was addressing Malia.

“I needed something to do,” she shrugged.

“You also could’ve told me,” Theo said to Liam. “Since you and apparently everyone else knew that Scott-”

“I thought you knew that part,” Liam said. His cheek was smushed against Theo’s shoulder, he felt Liam talking as he heard it. “It’s kind of obvious.”

“Maybe to you.”

“To anybody with a nose,” Malia said, and then she narrowed her eyes at Theo. “Oh.”

Theo’s face threatened to go hot. He swallowed it down. But Liam slipped his arm around Theo’s and that was enough to make Theo’s face heat up in a totally different way. He couldn’t look up, because he knew the girls would be looking at them.

“Well, you know now,” Liam said.

“Who knows what now?” Stiles asked, coming towards them. He was in new clothes; Theo couldn’t remember envying someone more than he did in that moment. “Is Jackson here?”

Lydia shook her head. “Waiting for his text.” She tied off Malia’s braid and put her hands on Malia’s shoulders. “Done. So hopefully it stays out of your way.”

“Thanks. Blood in hair is distracting,” Malia said.

Theo caught Lydia screwing up her mouth for half a second, before her face hardened. “It sure is,” she said.

Stiles sat next to Lydia, curled up in a semi-fetal position against her, and started chewing on his nails. Malia crawled up on top of both of them and used her elbows like weapons to get Stiles to make room for her between them. “Ow,” Stiles objected. “Excuse the hell out of me, I want to sit by my best friend.”

“Excused,” Malia said.

“You smell like meat, but that is somehow almost comforting,” Stiles told her.

Malia wrapped her arms around Lydia and loudly smacked a kiss onto Lydia’s cheek. “Good,” she said. “I want to comfort. This is going to be fine.”

“Sure,” Stiles said darkly. “That’s why we’re in a bunker. Because of how fine this is going to be.” He looked at Theo then, and his eyes widened when he saw Liam. It was enough to make a guy self conscious, actually, or it would be if Liam wasn’t holding onto him quite so firmly. But Stiles didn’t say anything in the end, and somehow Theo was almost disappointed.

“Stop being such a wet balloon,” Malia said to Stiles.

Lydia’s smile was warm. “It’s wet blanket,” she corrected.

“Or lead balloon,” Stiles pointed out, and scooted down so his head was in Malia’s lap. That didn’t seem like the safest spot. “Why would it be wet balloon? What does that even mean?”

“It’s not supposed to be wet,” Malia said, like that was obvious. “They’re usually dry.”

“Okay, but spray a balloon with water and what happens?” Stiles said. “Nothing. It’s just a wet balloon.”

“Like you’re being right now,” Malia said.

“I can’t stand you,” Stiles said. It didn’t have a ton of weight to it, though, what with how they were tangled up in each other.

Actually, Theo thought with growing upset, how dare Stiles look at him like this was weird? They were doing only a fraction of what everyone else in this pack was always doing with each other. Touching and cuddling and whatever. So what was it? Was it Theo? Did everyone think he didn’t deserve it, somehow? Because it’s not like it could be Liam - everyone liked Liam, he was the universal little brother. Sixteen, when most of them were eighteen. Maybe that was it.

Liam squeezed his arm. “Relax,” he murmured. He sounded half asleep again.

“Shut up,” Theo said.

“Where’s everybody else?” Liam asked.

Stiles answered. “Showering and eating.”

“You’re not eating?” Lydia said. “That’s a first.”

“Too nervous,” Stiles said.

Someone’s phone buzzed, and Lydia checked it. “Oh, good,” she said. “Jackson’s here.” She gave Malia a squeeze and got up. “Play nice,” she added to Stiles.

“When am I not nice!” he objected, but she was already halfway to the door. “If anything Jackson’s not nice to me,” he added to Malia, who was inspecting him with something like scientific curiosity.

“I never knew him,” she said. “So I don’t know if you’re lying.”

“Do I often lie?”

“Depends on how you define often.”

Theo wondered if he should get up for whoever this was. Jackson. It felt like sitting here was a gesture of weakness. But that probably mattered a lot less in a world where Scott’s pack was on his side. Stiles was way less hostile than before, for one. That was probably progress. It might even mean Lydia had a point. And while he was thinking all of that over, Lydia came back with Jackson. Well, with two people.

“Ethan’s here too,” she said, and her smile was fake and tense.

Stiles repeated the name to himself - _ETHAN?_ \- and then looked at Malia. Malia raised her eyebrows.

“Who?” Liam said, which made Theo feel a little better.

Lydia marched back over to them and sat down next to Malia again. “This is Jackson,” she said to Malia mostly. “And you remember Ethan.”

Jackson and Ethan were two buff guys. Of the two of them, Ethan was a little taller and a little less handsome. But that was only because Jackson had the kind of extremely symmetrical face that was gorgeous. Like, objectively. He was looking at Theo with sharp interest, and Theo returned the look.

Then something happened. Theo knew, hypothetically, how something buzzed inside of them when werewolves looked at each other. They always knew their own. This was his first time feeling it. The kanima in him shivered, and Jackson’s eyes were briefly an eye-popping acidic yellow, with slits for pupils. Then Jackson blinked, and they were normal again. “Whoa,” he said, a curious smirk spreading on his face. “What the hell are you?”

“You tell me,” Theo said.

“You’re like me but not.” Jackson narrowed his eyes. “Your eyes are normal werewolf.”

“Not quite normal,” Theo said, which made Jackson smile bigger.

Ethan spoke up too then. “Huh,” he said. “Interesting.” He was looking at Theo closely too. “You’re not a werewolf either. Your vitals aren’t right.”

“I talk, he listens,” Jackson said, by way of explanation.

Liam squeezed Theo’s arm tighter, straightened up a bit. And Lydia and Malia exchanged a significant look that Stiles wanted desperately to be part of. “Hold on,” Stiles said, eyes darting between everyone. “There’s a lot going on here, with eye contact and general vibes. And since when do the two of you know each other, anyways?”

“Since we both ended up in London,” Jackson said. His eyes returned to Theo. It felt eerily like Theo was being sized up to be eaten - and the weirdest thing was how Theo didn’t hate it. “You’re the chimera Lydia told me,” Jackson finally said.

“Might be. Which one did she tell you about?”

“The murderer.” It sounded like a compliment.

Theo found himself smiling. “We say reformed murderer now.”

Ethan laughed at that, and Jackson’s smile went dangerously big and the rush of victory felt good for all of a second until Liam separated himself from Theo. Liam, Theo discovered when he looked over at him, was glaring at the ground, his jaw clenched. He shouldn’t have made that murderer joke. Maybe everyone had just gotten over all of that, forgotten or even forgiven, and now they were upset and the looks they were exchanging meant that he shouldn’t have said anything.

“Another kanima makes this easier,” Ethan said to Jackson.

“Well, whatever the hell he is, it’ll help,” Jackson agreed, and returned his attention to Lydia.

Before he could say the next thing, Liam spoke up. “You know what he is,” he said sullenly. “You just said it. A chimera.”

“Who’s this,” Jackson demanded, looking at Liam with a skeptical kind of frown. “Since when do we let children in the pack?”

Liam lunged for Jackson out of nowhere, his eyes bright and gold. The moment Liam launched himself off the couch, Theo felt it happening and grabbed for him on instinct. He got Liam’s arm and the back of his shirt, but that wasn’t good enough. Theo was pulled to his feet by Liam’s pure brute force. He could already see himself being pulled into a fight next, but then Liam stopped. He stopped and let Theo haul him back, glowering at Jackson the whole time.

"That's exactly why saving the world should be adults only," Jackson said distastefully.

"We're eighteen," Lydia said. "Your mom had to rent your car for you like an hour ago."

"She's not my mom," Jackson grumbled.

"Not this again," Stiles sighed, staring dramatically at the ceiling. "You were adopted into the richest family in the county, it's not like you're the poor little matchstick girl."

Stiles didn't like Jackson, and the feeling was definitely mutual. “Why are you even here? Aren't you kind of busy being a cop?” Jackson said.

The resulting argument that exploded out of that was something that Theo didn't want to be at the center of. Didn't want Liam to be at the center of, what with Liam's anger issues making a sudden reappearance, so he took Liam by the shoulders and walked him away, towards another corner of the room. The one without weapons or electronics. "You need to cool down," he said to Liam, but Liam was fuming too intently to listen. So Theo kept them both moving until they were almost all the way in the corner. He pushed Liam up against one of the walls, making sure he was between Liam and everyone else, and then they just stood there. Theo's hands were still on Liam's shoulders, he realized after a second, and became very aware of his palms. They were warm.

Liam's jaw was set for all of a few moments until he wrenched his gaze away from Jackson and looked at Theo. The moment they made eye contact, the anger faded.

“What the fuck, man,” Theo said, now that Liam was listening.

“I don’t like him,” Liam said.

“I don’t give a shit, you can’t start a fight right now. We need you, and we need him.” The eye contact was starting to be kind of a lot, but Liam didn’t flinch. He didn’t even blink. His eyes were a color Theo couldn’t describe, light and opaque and steady. Theo could feel him breathing in his shoulders, a steady rhythm of in and out. Liam was coming down, he was okay.

“You need me?” Liam asked.

It was too much, to hear that question from this close. Theo let go and straightened up before answering. “Sure. Is that what you need to hear to relax?” he said. And he wondered if it was visible, how much he wanted to put his arms around Liam and take his anger like he took Kira's electricity. Absorb it into himself as an act of service, and in the process maybe make up for the other things he took without asking.

“I don’t like him,” Liam said again.

“No one’s asked you to.”

That was a point that hadn’t occurred to Liam. “Oh,” he finally said. “Okay.” He looked back at Theo, an expression on his face that Theo didn’t recognize but knew exactly what it meant. Liam was about to say something. It was going to make it hard for Theo to breathe. But then Scott and Kira came running up the steps with Derek and then Corey close behind, and Theo took a step back. _Caught_ , something in the primal part of his brain told him, so he kept distance between him and Liam while they prepared to head out.

Peter got there like a minute later, bitching at everyone and glancing at Malia every few seconds. “Well, my young progeny,” he finally said. “Shall we go cause some mischief?”

“You’re so lame,” Malia said. She kissed Lydia goodbye, pressed their foreheads together briefly and then went for the door where Corey was waiting. Malia was better than anyone else when it came to not saying things that didn’t need to be said.

Scott was, obviously, the worst at that. “Be careful,” he said to everyone left. “Don’t get separated.”

“We know,” Theo said. Stiles thought that was funny. He poked Derek too, and Derek seemed slightly less stony than usual. At least somebody thought it was funny because Liam gave Theo just a glance. Maybe he was mad. It was probably the murderer comment. He must’ve forgotten about that before fucking Jackson reminded him.

“Okay, well how about this. I love you,” Scott said, to Theo and then to everyone else. “I love all of you, and we’re going to be okay.” And Theo’s heart got all tight and solid, in his chest.

Theo drove, because Lydia’s car was at home and Stiles’ blue Jeep was so instantly recognizable it was like basically asking for someone to recognize and kill them. Liam took shotgun - so that probably did mean he didn’t hate him. Or maybe Liam was taking one for the team because Lydia and Stiles hated him more.

“Get in the left lane,” Liam said, and Theo did just in time to make the turn for the back way into the school parking lot.

Theo glanced over at Liam, then. There wasn’t a ton of light back here, a few street lamps spaced too widely, but when the light of one caught Liam’s face he was just looking out the window. He’d noticed Theo’s toothbrush. It probably wasn’t worth thinking about, what Stiles and Lydia were probably noticing. They were suspiciously silent, for them.

“We should go scout,” Stiles said once they were parked in a dark corner of the lot. “Liam, you’re with me. I’ll need your senses to make sure nothing’s waiting.”

Liam nodded, looked at Theo for a second. It was too much, to try and look back, but once Liam was out of the car it occurred to Theo that if something went wrong he would wish he’d looked. And it was stupid, to get like this over common words, but hearing someone say they needed Liam for something made Theo think about their interrupted conversation. About Liam looking up at him and saying, _You need me?_ And Theo had just brushed it off, because he’d never gotten any better at letting someone know when they knew him.

The cab was even quieter without Stiles and Liam. It was just Lydia, sitting in the back on the passenger side, and Theo trying not to drum on the steering wheel. No need to make any unnecessary sounds. No one could say whether or not the Anuk-Ite had the senses of werewolves.

“Well,” Lydia finally said. “I’m not screaming yet, so. Good sign, all things considered.”

It was a good sign, so Theo nodded. “Then why do I feel like throwing up,” he said, not for any particular reason or to any particular point. Rhetorical, mostly.

“Because dying isn’t the only threat,” Lydia said.

She was right, again, as usual. He knew that better than anyone. “Yeah,” Theo said. “Which. Speaking of that. I know I…”

“Stuck your claws in my neck, rifled through my memories, and left me catatonic for weeks?” Lydia asked, in the innocent tone she’d totally mastered.

“Yeah,” he had to repeat. “Sorry about that.”

Lydia huffed out a soft laugh. “You’re sorry,” she repeated.

In the privacy of darkness, Theo let his cheeks burn. He fumbled for what to respond with. “Well it might not be the right thing to say, or whatever, but you brought it up before, when…”

“I know I did,” Lydia said. “It’s not like I can forget.”

“Me neither,” Theo said on a sigh. Not really for her to hear.

But banshees must have had good senses too, because she huffed again. “I’m saying this as your friend - and I’m announcing that we’re friends because it seems like you wouldn’t be able to connect those dots yourself, so. You’d probably do a lot better with people if you spent less brainpower on self-loathing.”

“I don’t _loathe_ my-“ he began, and cut himself off. “What do you mean I’d do better?”

She leaned forward, a little closer to him. “I mean that it’s been a year, and you’re still assuming we’re going to change our minds out of nowhere. Which honestly only makes sense if you’re planning to betray us again. Are you planning to betray us again?”

“No, but-“

“Why did you apologize to us?” Lydia demanded, her tone so insistent he had to turn and look at her. “After the ghost rider stuff. You worked up the guts. Why did you do that if you thought it wouldn’t mean anything?”

He didn’t think that would be the end of it. More like the very beginning, a step towards no one trying to kill him in his sleep. Theo chewed on his lip. “Because,” he finally said. “I mean I didn’t think anyone would believe me.”

“Most of us didn’t,” she said. “So why do it?”

“Because… I don’t know.” He wanted the boys to come back and save him from having to answer, but the luck wasn’t on his side. “It was right,” he said finally, preemptively defensive. “I don’t know.”

Lydia sat back, took and let out a deep breath. “It was right,” she repeated. That meant something to her, but Theo couldn’t tell what even if his life depended on it.

There was a rap on his window, and then Theo’s door opened and Liam stood inside of it. Close, because he let the weight of the door closing push him right up against the frame. Even though he could bench five hundred pounds without breaking a sweat. “Hey,” Liam said softly. “No one’s here. Stiles thinks we should wait in the library, since we all know it pretty well.”

“Okay,” Theo nodded. He was looking at the steering wheel.

“Where’s Stiles?” Lydia asked.

“Inside. We figured he’d make more noise getting back out.”

Probably right. “Cool. Let’s go,” Theo said.

Liam didn’t move. He was waiting for something, and Theo was so afraid to give it to him that for several long moments they just stayed there, quietly. Lydia too. “Are you ready for this?” Liam asked. He was using that his most gentle tone, the one that made Theo want to douse himself in ice water.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” Theo said.

“Your worst fear.”

Oh. Okay. Somehow, Theo had gone through all this preparation without considering that. He might see her again, tonight. Tara. Well, at least he had experience with it. It was more frightening how Liam knew to warn him. Without needing to be told, he’d filled in enough of the dots to say something. Theo couldn’t think about that too closely.

“We’ll be here for you this time,” Liam said.

“You’ll be here?” Theo asked, and let himself look at Liam for his reaction. He regretted it immediately. Liam was there, paying attention, and Theo forgot about the entire existential threat facing them broadly because all he could think about was the way Liam was… just, was.

“We’re on the clock here, boys,” Lydia whispered, and set off for the school at a decent pace considering the three inch heels she was wearing.

Liam got out of the way so Theo could get out too. “This freaking fear monster,” Theo thought he heard him mumble. They set off after Lydia, moving quick and quiet. And on the way, Theo let himself have a sixty-second crisis.

It wasn’t like the last twenty-four hours were particularly weird, for him and Liam. This was generally how they acted. But usually there was like, weeks between the ten minutes they’d see each other and so much else to do that the initial high of Liam doing something like protecting him or saving his life faded. That was why things were getting so much more intense, in whatever way they were getting intense. In sort of the way that Theo was great at orchestrating when he was trying to get something out of someone but had never had actually just happen to him. Or it seemed like that kind of way. Theo really had no way of knowing. All he knew was that being wrong about this would kill him. Not just the being wrong but the way that would certainly put whatever there was to him and Liam’s friendship into the fucking ground. Liam wasn’t the kind to be freaked out by the whole gay part of it, probably. But it wasn’t unreasonable for anyone to find it impossible to be friends with someone after some kind of inept confession of whatever it was Theo would be hypothetically confessing. It would make things strange, without a doubt.

The thing that made it a crisis, though, was how he knew all of that factually and even though he knew it, he still couldn’t help it. Liking him, and his dumb sincerity and stupid trust in people and just everything. He wondered if it was totally obvious, how he’d do anything Liam asked him to do, and then he did have to allow himself a moment of comfort. It was obvious, Malia would’ve commented on it. But it felt kind of impossible, walking next to Liam, that no one else could tell how gone he was. Not head over heels, but. Not _not_ that either. In a word, pathetic. And that was ultimately another reason not to say anything, actually - Liam responded to pathetic by being kind, and that would be worst of all. And besides, maybe Liam was going to hate him in the long run anyways, anyways. That was definitely an option.

So, for sixty seconds, he was just aware of things. Of how Liam got the door for them, and stayed within arms reach. Closer than that, even. When Lydia was several steps ahead of them. He’d be there for Theo.

Liam got the door for the library too, held it open and looked at Theo as they passed close to each other. This wasn’t sustainable. They needed to not see each other for months after this, to keep things normal. Because Theo really desperately just wanted things to be normal and not scary anymore. No more awful hard decisions, please. He’d made enough of those. He wanted like. At least a year of total boredom.

The library was dark, all lights off. Moonlight came in the big window, enough to see by, but Theo couldn’t say he was totally at ease here. “Okay,” Stiles said, popping out of the stacks with an axe on his shoulder. He had an axe. That didn’t seem good. “So Lydia, once you scream you should get out of here. I don’t know what you’re afraid of but it’ll scare the shit out of me.”

“Good call,” Lydia said. “It’s a toss up between Eichen and basically every other time I’ve been experimented on, so.”

Theo screwed up his mouth. “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll pass.”

“I’ll go where we talked about,” Lydia said, and Stiles nodded. “What about them.” She gestured at Theo and Liam.

Stiles turned his attention to them, and Theo resisted the urge to fidget. “Okay,” Stiles said. “You’re gonna need to take him by surprise, so I was thinking on top of the stacks maybe? Jump down and. Y’know.” He mimed something with claws.

“How can we guarantee he’ll come by whatever shelf I’m on top of?” Theo demanded.

“Good point,” Stiles muttered. “Huh. Okay.” He chewed on his fingernail. “Okay. What if we rig a Home Alone style trap.”

“A what?” Theo’s patience was running low.

“You’ve never seen Home Alone,” Lydia said, and put her hand over her eyes. “Stiles, don’t make this into a whole thing.”

“Don’t make WHAT into a-“

“Rube Goldberg murder,” Liam explained.

“Okay. Cool,” Theo said. “Can we move on?”

“Hold on,” Stiles said. “You know who _Rube Goldberg_ is, but you-“

“Stiles!” Lydia snapped.

Stiles threw his hands up innocently and in the process did drop the axe. “Shit,” he said, picking it back up.

“Where are we gonna be? You and me,” Liam asked.

“Perimeter,” Stiles said. “Making sure they don’t surround us. Wolf out and make sure the only thing that gets in here is the Anuk-Ite. I’ll be in here to make sure nobody sneaks up on lizard boy.”

“Half lizard boy,” Theo said, and earned an exasperated smile from Stiles. Okay, maybe Stiles actually didn’t hate him.

“I should be in here,” Liam said stubbornly.

Theo’s heart betrayed him just like everything else; it skipped a beat, almost definitely audibly. At least only Liam could tell. Stiles had no idea, and he said, “No fucking way, baby wolf. I can’t run like you can, and the school isn’t exactly small. You’re out there.”

“And what if I mess up?” Liam said.

“Flee screaming,” Stiles suggested.

“If the hunters get in,” Lydia said. “Call my name. I’ll get us out of here.”

Oh good. He was definitely not afraid of whatever the fuck that meant. Theo needed this to happen as soon as possible so he couldn’t get psyched out. “Okay,” he said. “Let’s do it. Let’s get going. Come on, before something goes wrong with everybody else.”

So Theo ended up flat on his back on top of an eight-foot tall bookcase, listening as hard as he could with the slightly better than human senses he had. Stiles was somewhere, ready to set off whatever trap he ended up putting together. Lydia was hiding somewhere. Liam was somewhere. Not here. Somewhere else.

When the Anuk-Ite arrived, it was silent. That was actually the hint. In the cold, dead silence Theo felt his pulse ratcheting higher, his brain racing, and it was several seconds of this until he realized that this was artificial fear. He knew the taste of his own fear, and this wasn’t it.

For a second, he wondered if Stiles could tell too. And then he heard something that sounded a lot like the Sheriff. “Oh,” he said. “I know who’s in here. The hyperactive little bastard that ruined my life.” And then there was a new voice, a woman. “No. No, that’s not my son.”

Silence. Theo hoped Stiles wouldn’t crack.

“That’s not my son, he’s trying to kill me,” the woman whispered, and Theo fought off a shiver.

With a loud clatter, books fell off shelves one shelf to Theo’s left. Slightly further from the door. And then the attention was Theo, and when the thing spoke again it was with a new voice. Tara’s voice. Of course.

“You left me,” she said, and Theo knew it wasn’t her but that didn’t make any difference in the moment. He couldn’t breathe. But he also didn’t make a sound. “I’m going to take what’s mine,” Tara said, and Theo could feel her hands reaching into his chest for a second. He couldn’t breathe. His vision was getting spotty. But Stiles was here, and Tara was dead and this wasn’t real.

No sooner did he have that thought than the thing shifted again. He felt it rather than saw it; the hairs on his arms stood on end, and the hum of electricity filled the air. One of the Doctors was here. “Failure,” the Surgeon said in that dead, robotic voice. Theo’s eyes were already shut, and behind them he saw memories he was sort of always doing his best not to think about. When they put his fangs in, when they inserted his claws one at a time. Theo clenched his jaw, and made sure the kanima venom was ready. They were close. He could hear footsteps. And this third time when it shifted, he felt it happen, heard the difference between one step and the next.

“I don’t care how sorry you are,” it said with Liam’s voice. “I’ll never forgive you.” It paused right underneath him. He should lunge, he should get down and paralyze it, but Theo’s body wouldn’t move. “You don’t deserve it,” not-Liam continued. “And you know that, don’t you.”

Worst fear, Theo told himself. This didn’t mean anything.

Even if it did, though. Even if Liam hated him, Theo would save his life anyways. Scott had made Theo the center of the plan to save his entire pack, he trusted him, and that meant something. And as much as Theo liked to wish he was still pragmatic and cold-hearted, the uncomfortable reality was that he honestly couldn’t care less whether or not they liked him. They’d saved him. So he’d return the favor.

He relied on the little bit of instinct he had to make sure he fell correctly. There were two impacts, his feet on the floor and his claws into the brainstem of the body the Anuk-Ite was using. He felt it go limp in his grip, but still he twisted his claws in to make sure he really severed all the connections. Mission accomplished. It wasn’t Liam, he looked at its horrific skinless face to reassure himself. Not Liam, not real.

“Nice fucking work,” Stiles said, coming out from where he’d been hiding. “One-shot, huh.”

Theo dropped the body. “Almost too easy,” he said. And then he saw Stiles go green, and he knew what that meant. Blood. There was blood on a knife the creature was holding, and Theo couldn’t feel his chest. It was shock. He didn’t need to look to get the picture; things probably weren’t great.

“Lydia?” Stiles called out, panic making his voice crack.

“I’m fine,” Theo said, and made his way to one of the tables so he could sit down. “I’ll heal.”

“You all act like that’s some sort of silver bullet,” Stiles grumbled. “Lie down, idiot, you need to slow this bleeding down.” He manhandled Theo down onto the floor, flat on his back, and then just panicked.

Theo was finding it hard to breathe. “I can’t believe you’re making werewolf puns,” he said, and wheezed next time he breathed.

“I can! I fucking can. What am I supposed to do? I’m not a fucking field medic, I’m the goddamn comic relief. Where the fuck is Lydia.”

“Why,” Theo said when he could. “Is she a field medic?”

“I cannot stand you,” Stiles said. “I mean that sincerely. As a person that heard that your worst fear is the kid being mad at you, I can say with total certainty that you’re a person I despise being around. But I’ll be damned if I’m letting you die.”

Theo put a hand on his chest, over the spot that was quickly starting to feel not so great. The fabric of his crewneck was sopping wet. God. This wasn’t good. “Who said anything about dying?” he managed.

“Y’know what I hate about you?” Stiles took off his hoodie and put it over Theo’s chest awkwardly.

Theo raised his hand to hold it there. “Do we have time for that list?” he asked.

“You’re a really good liar,” Stiles said.

“I’ve stopped,” Theo began, and paused for air.

“You’re a really good liar,” Stiles repeated firmly, “but you have no idea when you’re lying to yourself. Stop trying to talk. You did your job, now it’s our job to get you out of here.”

Theo obeyed. Breathing was enough to concentrate on, for the moment. Maybe he’d punctured a lung. That was a pain in the ass to heal, he hoped it wasn’t that.

The library door slammed open, and Theo smelled blood. He forced his eyes open and found Liam running up and dropping to his knees next to him. Liam’s eyes were bright gold, a color that struck Theo as precious tonight. Not a killer, but a fighter. And he kept fighting for Theo, for whatever fucking reason. Sure, it was Theo’s fear that he’d wise up eventually. Yeah. But really, who could blame him.

Liam laced their fingers together first thing, and the veins in his arms stood out black as he siphoned off Theo’s pain. “Don’t do that,” Theo said. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not fine, you got stabbed,” Liam said, and looked up at Stiles. “We need to get out of here. I heard cars coming. Lots of them. Where’s Lydia?” He kept his hands around Theo’s. Seemed like an oversight. Theo couldn’t bring himself to remind him.

“I’ll go find her,” Stiles said, and hoisted the axe up again. “Don’t go anywhere.”

“Not likely,” Theo coughed. It got a lot better, after coughing. His chest was starting to work normally again. Maybe that was all Liam, though. Taking Theo’s pain without even needing a second to make it happen. It probably wasn’t worth thinking about, what Scott loved to say about needing to care to do this thing. Actually, that combined with how Liam’s attention was so single-mindedly focused on Theo meant that the progress he made on breathing was really a wash.

When Theo met Liam’s eyes, he was sure it was deafeningly obvious exactly what it did to him. And yet, somehow Theo couldn’t say anything to distract him. Hell, maybe he didn’t want to distract him, not really. The last thing he wanted was for Stiles to be right, and Stiles said Theo lied to himself. So maybe if he was being honest, the thing he wanted more than anything was to just fucking say what he was thinking. All of it, out loud. Maybe he was sort of dying for that, like. Maybe he’d wanted it for longer than he could even tell.

“Hey,” Liam said. Always, so gentle. “How you feeling?”

Theo lifted their hands into the light, saw there was still black under Liam’s skin. Still the psychic or whatever connection between Theo’s nervous system and Liam’s that meant without a doubt that Liam cared about him. “Better now,” Theo said, hoping for double entendre but suspecting he missed the mark.

“How was the fear stuff?” Liam asked.

That was exactly the opening he needed - so perfect that maybe Liam knew he needed it. “Fine,” Theo said, shutting his eyes again. “It tried to convince me you hated me.”

“What?” Liam’s grip on him slackened for a second, and then got tighter than before.

“Didn’t throw me,” Theo said. “Don’t worry. I can handle being despised by now, so. Got the fucker.” Brain was probably still under his fingernails. Theo made a mental note to wash his hands.

Liam was silent for a second. “Hold on,” he said then. “Did you think that might be true?” There was something delicate in his voice, something Theo immediately worried he would injure. “Theo, look at me,” Liam said. He never gave orders. Theo opened his eyes. It was too much basically immediately; Liam was looking at him with such genuine upset all over his face that it hurt in a new kind of way. And Liam began to ask again, “Did you think that might be-“

“Yeah!” Theo said. “Maybe. I don’t know. I hoped… I hoped not,” he admitted. Speaking his mind, that’s what he wanted to do, and yet saying it felt like ripping his chest open himself. There really wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for Liam - it was a realization that should probably feel more dangerous than it did. But it was Liam, and Liam said things like _we’ll be there for you_ and meant it. That was the thing. He really meant it. “I really hoped not,” Theo repeated, and bit his lip to keep himself from saying anything else.

“You’re bad at listening,” Liam said. “So I’m totally cool with saying this again, if I have to, but I don’t hate you. I kind of… opposite of hate you.”

“The opposite of hatred is indifference,” Theo said, like an idiot.

Liam gave him a very unamused look, but he said what Theo was hoping he would. “What I’m trying to tell you is that I like you,” he said without hesitation.

Somehow, this was harder than not talking about it - and Theo could already hardly remember how they didn’t talk about it before now. But there really wasn’t anything he wouldn’t do for Liam. “I know I like you,” he said with great effort. “So that’s good.”

That wasn’t something Liam expected. “Do you…” he hesitated.

“I swear to God, if you ask if I _like_ you like you, I’ll take it back,” Theo said, and meant it with all his heart.

Liam smiled, sighed in a way that was also a laugh and made a face to try and keep from smiling bigger. “Okay,” he said. “I guess that’s enough of an answer anyways.”

“You couldn’t tell?” Theo asked.

“I had a hunch, but. I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you - you’re kind of hard to read sometimes,” Liam said, his smile as big as ever. “Half the time it seems like you don’t want to look at me.”

Theo grimaced at a pulse of pain in his chest, and Liam tightened his hand and took the pain without blinking. “I _don’t_ want to look at you,” Theo said. “Because you look back.” That was kind of nonsense. It felt right coming out, and then he heard himself say it and regretted it.

“Don’t worry,” Liam said, with the warmness in his eyes that had Theo ready to run. “I won’t tell anyone what I see.”

That shouldn’t work on Theo; he was too smart to fall for something like that. But it wasn’t falling for something. Liam couldn’t lie for shit. If Theo asked, he’d bet Liam would say he didn’t even want to be better at it. So Theo _didn’t_ panic or doubt him, for once. He tried to let himself trust in Liam’s hand around his, that it’d be there as long as he needed it. One second that felt like an obvious fact, but the next it was too good to be true.

Then Stiles was back with Lydia. “Shouldn’t he be healing faster?” he said when he saw them.

“I’m healing the normal way that I heal,” Theo said testily.

“Well,” Lydia said. “Malia texted. They’re coming here, and all the hunters are coming too. Final showdown. I called in team one, too.”

“I’m standing up,” Theo said to Liam, which ended up meaning that Liam pulled him to his feet and then kept him there with an arm around him. Almost seemed like maybe Liam wanted to be under Theo’s arm, holding him. Just waiting for the excuse.

There was a lot of that, tonight. In ten more minutes Theo’s chest was fully healed and he was fine, if a little sore, but Liam not only refused to leave him anywhere alone, he also kept a hand on Theo at all times. On his arm or shoulder or standing close enough for some part of them to touch - elbow or hip or sides. And it wasn’t like Liam needed to do that, Theo wasn’t in pain, but Liam just kept doing that. Theo couldn’t even bring himself to worry if it was normal, he liked it so much. Fuck. He liked Liam so much.

They were spreading out - some of them in the locker room, some in the library. Liam and him went for the locker room, since they were familiar with it. Stiles and Lydia stayed in the library. Same reason. And then it was more waiting in silence, with Liam listening for anyone approaching.

“Do you hear anything?” Theo asked after a second.

“No. Shh.”

“I’m sure me talking won’t make the difference between-“

Liam gave him a look. “You’re distracting,” he cut him off.

“How. You have superpowers.”

“I guess you do too,” Liam said. “Which X-man has superhuman annoying capabilities?” 

“I don’t know what those are, but-”

Liam, apparently fed up, knocked Theo back against the lockers with one hand. Not hard enough to hurt but firm enough to keep him there, Liam’s hand in the middle of Theo’s chest. An inch from Theo’s heart. Liam wasn’t looking at him, he had his eyes closed to listen harder, so that just meant Theo had total freedom to watch Liam’s face in a way he couldn’t usually. He examined the little furrow between his brows and the shape of his nostril and the corner of his mouth and thought that if he spent any more time on it he could memorize Liam’s face on a cellular level.

It was a surprise when Liam opened his eyes and they made eye contract. Theo felt caught again, until Liam smiled. “What?”

“Nothing.” Theo was proud to get anything out at all, his head was spinning so hard with proximity and implications. His eyes flickered down to Liam’s lips for a fraction of a second, one he hoped that Liam missed. And Theo still couldn’t move. He could sort of understand why Liam always let him do this.

“They’re a couple minutes out,” Liam said. “I think. I’m not great at the accuracy.”

“Reassuring to hear,” Theo said. He couldn’t help but stretch his own senses out as far as they’d go, to listen for a second. And then he had a great idea. “Hey, let me go.”

Liam dropped his hand immediately. “What are you thinking?”

Theo was thinking that he could hear the electricity in the lights overhead. He hopped up on a bench and from there climbed up on the lockers with a little effort. “Turn on the showers. Cover the floors,” he said to Liam. 

“Home Alone again,” Liam said with half a smile. “Awesome.”

“If you say so,” Theo muttered.

They worked well together. Theo stripped the wires and tested it, closing his fingers around the bare end. He felt the zap, not as strong as Kira but enough to stop anyone else in their tracks. While he did that, Liam got the whole floor covered in about an inch of water, and then sloshed back to Theo. “It’s working?” he asked.

“Yeah.” Theo hopped down, pulling the cord with him. He’d hide as long as he could, lure them in.

“Show me.”

“No. I’m not going to electrocute you just for fun.”

Liam rolled his eyes. “Whatever. Where should I be?”

“Get up on a bench,” Theo said. “Out of sight. I’ll do this, then you can-“

“Yeah, I get it.”

“Okay.”

The moment the silence lasted more than a second, Theo found it hard to look at him again. He meant it when he said Liam saw too much. Matter of time before Liam found him lacking.

“Hey,” Liam said then. “What was it like, to kill the thing?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well like… morally.”

Oh. Right. Fuck. “Uh,” Theo said. “Not a person anymore, so.”

“But it _was_ a person,” Liam said.

“Well, yeah. But it’s not murder to hack up a corpse.”

The wrong thing to say; Liam wrinkled his nose. “Okay…” he said, but he was very clearly unsure.

“What the hell do I know, though,” Theo said. “Morality isn’t my strong suit. You think I shouldn’t have done it?”

“I didn’t say that.”

He _didn’t_ say that, but everything Liam thought was so clearly written all over every inch of his face that it was kind of pointless to pretend otherwise. “Okay,” Theo said. He touched the end of the wire, and the floor of the room snapped with electricity for a second.

“I’m not judging you,” Liam said. He was sitting on the bench cross-legged. Like some kind of high school jock yogi. Obnoxious. Theo couldn’t help but smile. “I know you had to-“

“I didn’t, though,” Theo said. “Not every time.”

Liam glared at him so hard he could feel it. “I know.”

“Well, I’m just saying. If it’s a problem-“

“It’s not, it’s a question. Okay? Can you let me ask a question without thinking that’s the end of the world?”

“What, because you’re so eager to hear about the things I’ve done?”

“You can’t be mad at me for not wanting to hear,” Liam began, and then stopped for a second. Cocked his head, for a second, and then tuned back in to talking with Theo. “Not wanting to hear you get all, like.” He hesitated. “I know, okay? I know who you are, you don’t have to try and scare me by saying stuff like that.”

Theo’s instant reaction was not good, not worth saying. He could feel the words he would _not_ say, the urge to snap at Liam almost but not quite all-consuming. He wasn’t trying to scare him, he could say. If the facts were scary maybe that was just the point, the reason that it ultimately didn’t matter whether or not they liked each other, because it wouldn’t work anyways. Liam was principled and did the right thing and more than that, knew what the right thing was. Theo knew he was the opposite, even if Liam didn’t.

“I’m not mad at you,” Theo said, because he could mean that.

Liam almost smiled. “Okay,” he said. “Are you sure?”

“You’d know,” Theo said. And, in the interest of saying what he thought, he added, “You’re not that wrong, usually.”

“High praise,” Liam said, and then he straightened up for a second. “Oh wait, they just opened the door. Get ready.”

The plan worked, with one little hiccup. The first person in the room was Jackson with Ethan right on his tail. His actual, literal tail. Theo couldn’t think of any way to succinctly communicate what was going on here, but Jackson took one look at the cord dangling and the water on the floor and then looked at Ethan, who nodded. Jackson and Ethan both took running leaps at the rows of lockers and barely got up before a half dozen hunters ran in behind them. Theo made the connection then, let the current build for a second and then released it and every person touching the floor stiffened and collapsed.

“Thank God,” Jackson said. “I was worried they’d have insulated boots or some shit.”

“You have a tail?” Liam asked.

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

Theo kept his grip on the cord, kept the power in his veins because even he could hear how many people were coming towards them. It just made his bones feel like they might crumble into dust, no big deal.

“Theo,” someone said. Ethan, he didn’t know Ethan’s voice. “You okay?”

“Yup,” Theo said.

“Really?” Liam was so worried.

Theo looked him in the eye for that. “Yeah,” he said. “I’m fine. Stay up there.” More people ran in then - Theo didn’t even see their faces, his vision was almost whited out, he just let go. The room smelled like burned hair. Theo didn’t let himself think about it much, he readied the next burst.

“You can’t do that, right?” Ethan asked after the third round of people were on the ground. It didn’t sound like anyone else was coming, but Theo couldn’t be sure. He had to stay ready.

“No,” Jackson said. “That’s something else.”

“Kitsune,” Liam said. “Like Kira.”

“I don’t know Kira,” Jackson said.

“I do,” Ethan said. “She’s fucking terrifying.”

“I don’t have her whole thing,” Theo said. “No genetic ancestral legacy or tails or anything.”

Jackson looked at Ethan, and hopped off the lockers. “She has a tail? You didn’t mention that.”

Ethan rolled his eyes and hopped down too. That was enough of a sign that they were safe, so Theo dropped the cord and let himself breathe. His hand tingled, in a numb sort of way. He looked down. It was scorched. That was the kind of thing people might overreact about, so Theo closed it into a fist and inhaled deep through his nose. “Not a literal tail,” Ethan said. “It’s a sword or something. I still don’t really get it.”

“No, the sword’s something else,” Liam said. “It’s like a spiritual weapon. She keeps her tails somewhere secret because it takes like a hundred years to get them.”

“Do _not_ say that like it makes sense,” Jackson sighed.

The sword sent Theo to hell, but the sword also brought him back. Theo thought he could hear something, something that sounded a lot like a door screeching open and someone dragging herself closer. But none of the bodies on the floor were moving. Some of them had gotten three shocks, they were probably dead.

There was a hand on his arm, but it was so unmistakably Liam that Theo didn’t waste any time with being surprised. “Hey,” Liam said. “Breathe. What’s up?”

“Nothing.”

Liam went to take his hand and Theo’s luck was bad enough that Liam found the charring on his palm. He didn’t say anything, took Theo’s hand anyways and all of a sudden Theo’s arm felt normal. _Show off_ , Theo thought about saying. But the words stuck in his throat. He was starting to suspect that he really wasn’t built to use these powers, and that was something he wasn’t ready to follow to its logical conclusion just yet.

“Does it do that to you every time?” Liam asked. He leaned in, maybe, he was so close. As the last remnants of the current faded from Theo’s veins and the fog of pain cleared, he saw several things at once. The black veins in Liam’s arm, the way he was looking at Theo’s hand, his lashes, and it struck Theo all over again how _close_ they were. Fuck. They were so close. He almost wished Liam was holding him here, to give them an excuse.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Jackson said. Theo was suddenly very aware of him, watching them from where he leaning against the lockers. Ethan was right next to him, holding his hand. Oh. Holding his hand. “Don’t tell me we’ve got competition for gay supernatural power couple, now.”

Liam frowned. “Well, depends on if you count Mason and Corey,” he said, missing the point.

“We’re not together,” Theo said for him. Their connected hands burned, but he couldn’t bring himself to let go.

Jackson scoffed. “Okay,” he said. “Which one of you doesn’t think he’s gay? Is it you?” he added to Theo directly. “I mean I’d say there’s no way you’re straight but you do _not_ pull off those Chucks so. It could go either way.”

“Okay,” Liam began, in the kind of tone that made it clear he was going to make a big deal about this.

And then an arrow sprouted out of Theo’s shoulder. It felt like a punch; he stumbled, and then saw it and by the time he processed it there was one in Ethan’s thigh, too. Ethan’s wound hissed black; there must be wolfsbane on them.

Liam’s eyes went gold, and he was running at the source in the same second. There was some kid standing in the door, holding a bow like he’d never touched one before in his life. Jackson followed, banking off one row of lockers in a way that seemed to imply he could walk horizontally on them if he wanted to. That was new, Theo was pretty sure he couldn’t do that.

The kid had a gun, too. Nolan, Theo found his name after a couple seconds of thinking. Nolan. Lacrosse player. Nolan shot at Liam, clipped his arm but that wasn’t nearly enough to stop him. Liam reached out with a swipe that would eviscerate and mostly missed. Hit Nolan’s arm, which jostled his shot so he missed the second time. And then Jackson sprang at him, got his own claws in and then stumbled back with an arrow jammed in his throat. But Nolan was paralyzed; he fell down, quiver slipping from his grip, and Theo took a deep breath of relief that didn’t last.

Liam sort of roared, which was extremely stupid, and picked up Nolan’s limp body and threw him into the wall. And it was then that Theo realized that, oh shit, Liam was actually angry. It had been so long since Theo had seen it that he almost didn’t recognize it. But once he did, he couldn’t move fast enough. “Liam,” he said.

All Liam did was shout again - half a roar, half a scream, and he pinned Nolan against the lockers with an iron grip. Theo was in arms reach now, he knew he should probably be cautious given the out-of-control werewolf about to disembowel his classmate, but. It was Liam. It was just Liam.

Theo said his name again, got around so he could try and look him in the eyes. Liam was panting, deep angry breaths and his hands were shaking. “You don’t want to do this,” Theo said.

“Yes I do,” Liam said through gritted fangs.

“No you don’t,” Theo said, but that wasn’t good enough. He had to reach Liam. He _had_ to stop him, and so Theo sucked a deep breath and opened up whatever shriveled up part of him did empathy best. “Liam. You’re going to regret this in about two minutes, and I’m not going to let you do that to yourself, so. If I have knock you out myself, I will, but I really don’t want to. Please, Liam. Don’t make me.”

It was working. Liam was a little less tightly coiled, and he met Theo’s eyes. “He’s…” Liam began.

Theo was nodding already. “I know,” he said. “It’d feel good. For all of ten seconds. And then it won’t.” He hesitated before playing the last card - like, what was the difference between manipulation and knowing someone? How thin was that line? But fuck it. “Trust me, okay? I’d know.”

That did it. Liam let Nolan go and rolled his shoulders and his eyes were blue again. He was still breathing hard. “How’s your shoulder?” he asked first.

“Well, we should probably rip this thing out sooner rather than later,” Theo said. And then it hit him, how much it _was_ to be Liam’s first cogent thought in any set of circumstances. “I’m fine,” he added. “The other guys are probably worse.”

That didn’t make any kind of dent. Liam put his hand on Theo’s chest, the arrow between two fingers, and the pain faded just in time for Liam to pull the bolt straight out of the muscle. “For fuck’s sake,” Theo started, but it didn’t hurt anymore and Liam was smiling at him.

“You said rip it out,” Liam shrugged.

Theo was breathless, and it wasn’t the arrow. It was just somehow better, for Liam to be so dumb and nice most of the time and razor sharp every once in a while. It kept Theo on his toes. Made the whole kindness thing seem a lot less stupid.

“Oh, right,” Jackson said from somewhere over Liam’s shoulder. “And you’re not together. How could I ever get that misconception.” Venomous in every single way - Theo had to appreciate it. He could only appreciate it because Liam didn’t take his hand away. That might’ve been the only thing keeping Theo standing.

They were all hobbled at this point, which made the sound of more incoming recently-drafted hunters fill the room with a thick layer of dread. The other three heard it first, with Jackson and Liam exchanging a worried look and Liam going pale. “We can do this,” Liam said anyways. A good little alpha-in-training. Theo was deciding how to answer when his eardrums burst.

Well, didn’t _burst_ but definitely popped and rang. Every one of them clapped their hands over their ears. The sound lasted maybe five seconds. Theo had heard Lydia before, he knew what a banshee could do in theory, but for the first time he understood why it was called a wail. It didn’t make him afraid as much as it filled him with deep, all-consuming sorrow. Even when it stopped the silence was mournful.

“Jesus,” Jackson said, and checked on Ethan. “Don’t move too fast.”

“You’re the one with this shit near your heart,” Ethan said, but he looked a little green. There was a black hole in his thigh, wolfsbane definitely spreading like rot under his skinny jeans. “So she figured it out, huh.”

“Yes,” Lydia said from the doorway. “I have figured it out. Thank you for noticing.” She stepped inside, delicately stepping over a body. Still in heels. “Seems like you handled this on your own.” Then she looked pointedly at Jackson and Ethan. Jackson’s hand was on Ethan’s cheek.

Jackson opened his mouth, and there was a moment of visible calculation. “I’m gay,” he said. Which seemed redundant, but. Whatever.

Several more seconds of silence. Lydia blinked. “Thank God. I thought you would _never_ figure it out.”

Jackson didn’t seem to know how to take that. He was surprised, and then he sort of laughed, and then Ethan laughed and Lydia cracked a smile. “Come on,” she said. “Monroe’s on her way, and Scott doesn’t want to let anyone get cornered. Can you walk?”

“I’ll make it,” Ethan said.

The final showdown was on the lacrosse field - which, of course it was. That’s how things worked in Beacon Hills. It was after sunset, the sky dark and field lights on. Everyone was here, looking worse for the wear. Scott was bleeding from a couple places, Derek had holes in his shirt for injuries already healed, Kira was crackling with energy, her sword extended at her side. The deputy guy, Parrish was here too, naked and on fire. They were the heavy hitters, the front line.

The back line was the really injured people. Peter was on one leg, leaning heavily on Malia who was tolerating it. Stiles was standing near them, arms crossed, blood dripping from his temple and his lip. He’d taken someone’s shotgun and had it cradled against his shoulder. Theo didn’t see Corey, but he figured that was probably to be expected.

He and Liam settled somewhere in the middle, with Jackson and Ethan. Lydia went straight to Malia, to give her a quick kiss and a pat on the arm. “Wolfsbane?” she asked.

“Yeah,” Malia said. “You sounded super strong.”

“Well, a certain someone encouraged me to practice,” Lydia said airily, and then gave Malia a smile.

They were dating. Theo felt relatively confident saying they were also in love - it had been like more than a year, probably. They were super secure. Then there was Jackson and Ethan, who were the kind of in sync that came with being together for a while. And somehow all of that was making Theo think about how Jackson was just so convinced that Theo and Liam were together. Did they act like that, like the couples did? Did they have that kind of simpatico thing? Or did it just look like they did?

Liam reached out for him again, rested his hand on Theo’s shoulder and leaned against him. It seemed like the kind of thing that was preempting some sort of comment, but Liam just leaned on him. Like he liked being there.

“Are you surrendering?” Monroe asked, emerging from the dark into the light. She was holding a semi-automatic. Ready to mow them down.

“No,” Scott said. “Are you?”

“No fucking way.”

“This was your guidance counselor?” Theo said to Liam, because he sort of couldn’t believe it.

Liam snorted. “Emphasis on the was,” he said. “And she wasn’t that good at it.”

“Kept asking me about my heritage,” Kira said, turning half towards them. “Though I’ve gotta say it’s almost a relief to find out it was about that and not some weird weeb thing.”

“Still could be that,” Stiles said from somewhere over Theo’s shoulder. “She probably wouldn’t want to admit to that.”

Scott and Monroe were shouting back and forth through all of that, on and on about how she didn’t have to do this and the oppression of humans. Blah blah. Whatever. Peter muttered to Malia, “The villainous dramatic monologue is really _so_ passe. And impractical.”

Malia scoffed. “Please. You never shut up.”

“And I was defeated by a team of teenagers. My point stands.”

“Please,” Stiles said. “Please tell me you’re not taking the moral high ground about your own evildoings.”

“Don’t be dramatic,” Peter said.

“Don’t be dramatic? Don’t be- please! Can you even hear yourself?”

“Quite well, thank you.”

Peter and Stiles were bickering so loudly that Theo missed the reveal moment. But then Theo heard a new voice on the field, and turned back to the front to find some old man wrestling Monroe for her gun while Corey sort of awkwardly hovered. When the old man won, he dismantled it in about ten seconds and told her she was disowned and a bunch of other stuff. Any other time, Theo would be listening to the monologue full of details he could potentially use. He’d be hanging onto every word. And he didn’t even realize he wasn’t doing that at first, just. He didn’t feel the same compulsion to hoard information that he did. It didn’t seem relevant, in the middle of the pack with Liam’s cheek pressed into his shoulder. Felt like something he could get used to.

But that was probably a long ways ahead, so Theo wasn’t going to put the cart before the horse. Liam liked him. That was a good start. They didn’t need to be anything more than that.

——xXx——

Liam did not have a boyfriend, exactly, but he also basically did. It was hard to be any more obvious. After Chris came and like sort of arrested Monroe to take her back to France for some sort of trial - Liam was foggy on the details of that, but he knew as much as he needed to - everyone piled into cars and went to McDonald’s. Healing made everybody hungry.

Theo drove his truck, and Liam got in the passenger seat. His foot brushed the bag on the floor again. Theo was living out of his truck which was bad but, he’d trusted Liam to know that, which was awesome. Theo had a lot of secrets. It was nice to be included. And that was one of the ways Liam knew that they’d be official pretty soon. 

Stiles and Derek were in the back seat, on opposite sides, not talking to each other for some reason. But whatever, let them be like that. Liam was feeling actually kind of good.

“Wasn’t there a third guy you absorbed?” Liam asked Theo. “Donovan.”

That got him the look Theo loved to give him, the wide-eyed _don’t fucking say that!_ Theo didn’t want him to say a lot of things. Mostly because he was convinced that he’d snuck into Scott’s pack when no one was watching and once everybody noticed he’d be kicked out again. But that was something they were going to work on; Liam was starting a list. “Yeah,” Theo answered. “Donovan.”

“What was his deal? Werewolf-kitsune-kanima-what?”

“Wendigo.” Theo kept his eyes firmly on the road.

Liam waited, half expecting Stiles to have something to say, or Theo to add more of an answer. “So what did you get from that?” Liam asked when neither of them said anything.

“Teeth,” Theo said.

“Teeth,” Liam repeated.

“I got those like. I dunno. They have teeth. To eat people with,” Theo added meanly, clearly intending to blow this up.

Liam didn’t roll his eyes. “Can I see?”

“No.” That sounded like the end of the conversation, and Liam was ready to drop it. Sure, Theo liked being pushed but Liam always felt bad doing it. But then, Theo did have something else to say. “It hurts, to like.” He bared his teeth. “Y’know. Make them come out.”

“Is it supposed to hurt?”

“Gee, I don’t know, Liam. I guess I’ll go ask another chimera with four sets of-“

“Okay, alright. Sorry I asked,” Liam said, and looked out the window instead of staring at Theo some more.

When they got to the drive through, there was a black Mustang already at the speaker. “Nice car,” Derek said.

“It is not,” Stiles grumbled. “It’s a rental, anyways.”

So that was Jackson and Ethan and Lydia. Malia had gone with her dad - or not her dad, she didn’t like it when they called Peter her dad but she also didn’t seem to particularly like her actual dad either so Liam just called him Peter and avoided it. So. Malia had stuck with Peter, who wasn’t healing because of the wolfsbane, with Scott and Kira. Corey had gone to get Mason. Liam knew he didn’t need to keep track of all of them, he knew Scott was doing it, but something in him just liked to know. The same thing that liked it better when Theo was right next to him.

Finally, Jackson pulled forward so Theo could too. “What does everybody want?” Theo asked.

Liam saw somebody’s hand in his peripherals, looked and found it was Derek’s, holding a credit card. “I’ll pay,” Derek said.

“He’s rich, don’t fight it,” Stiles said.

Then Stiles hung out the back window and ordered a ridiculous amount of food, so Liam and Theo did too, just slightly less ridiculous amounts because neither of them quite trusted Stiles to not be pulling a prank. But Derek got four quarter pounders and didn’t say anything.

After they got their six large bags of everything and distributed them to everybody, Theo started driving again. “Wait, hold on,” Liam said. He was navigating holding both him and Theo’s bags, and trying not to get too excited about how Theo had handed it to him without a second thought. Like they were a team. No big deal. “Where are we going?”

“Scott’s,” Theo said. “He said his mom wants to see us. Make sure we’re okay or something.”

“Aw. That’s nice of her.” Liam reached into his bag for a McDouble. “You want something? Fries?”

Theo was quiet for a second, and Liam frowned over at him. “I want you to not eat in my car,” Theo finally said, awkwardly, which was how Liam knew he actually meant it.

Liam froze, and slowly put the McDouble back. “Oh. Uh.”

“It’s fine.”

From the backseat, Stiles piped up. “You bet your ass it’s fine, if someone tried to take this McChicken away from me, I’d-“ There was the sound of a brief scuffle, crinkling paper, and then Stiles said, “HEY!”

Before Liam could turn to look, Derek yanked the bags out of Liam’s lap, too. And then he just sat back there, with all of the food on the floor between his feet like some kind of dragon that hoarded fast food.

“This is illegal,” Stiles said, once he got tired of trying to sneak a hand in a bag. “You _know_ fries aren’t as good cold, you know that, how could you do this to me?”

Derek didn’t seem to care. “You’ll live.”

“Well, considering you won’t even run to a Taco Bell and get me a Baja Blast, one might think you have some making up to do,” Stiles said grumpily. “And _one might think_ that letting a certain someone have some hot french fries would-“

“Who got pinned behind a desk by six guys with machine guns and needed to be rescued? And who got shot two dozen times to do the rescuing? Sorry I’m not feeling up to a hundred meter sprint.”

That was the most Liam had maybe ever heard out of Derek, so he was starting to get worried that Derek was like, actually mad. Stiles didn’t seem worried, though. “It’d be probably at least eight hundred,” he said without missing a beat. “Meters. It’s like four blocks away.” And then after a few seconds where Liam tried to think of something to say to make things normal again, Stiles added, “You were pretty kickass.”

“I was extremely kickass,” Derek said. He sounded satisfied. And they stopped arguing after that, so Liam figured he didn’t get how they worked yet.

Scott’s place was close, they were there in like five minutes. Once they were all out of Theo’s truck, Derek handed the bags back.

“Thanks,” Theo said. “You didn’t have to do that.”

He really didn’t. Liam was going to stop anyways, but whatever. Liam dug into his bag and ate his McDouble in two bites while they were talking.

“My pleasure,” Derek was saying. “I don’t even let food in the car in the first place.”

“He used to let gum in,” Stiles said, morosely chewing on some definitely cold fries.

“Until what?” Liam asked.

“Until I had to order a special cleaning solution to get gum residue off leather after _someone_ managed to get two pieces of Juicyfruit between the seats,” Derek said extremely pointedly.

Stiles had taken a large sip from his Dr. Pepper, which stopped him from being able to answer as quick as he usually did. “Okay,” he said once he could. “Okay, but now that you have it, I feel like I should be able to have all the gum I want. That seems like a reasonable compromise.”

“Seems like you don’t know what a compromise is,” Theo said, which made Stiles furious. Especially after Derek gestured at Theo like he’d just proven some kind of point. Liam thought it was kind of funny. But then it did occur to him that Stiles didn’t exactly laugh a lot. Maybe being mad was the way they were funny with each other.

They didn’t stay at Scott’s long. Jackson barely set foot inside before he was complaining about everything. Malia and Lydia split first, after ten minutes, and then it seemed like everybody remembered they were tired and needed to shower. Liam was extremely prepared to offer Theo the couch - he knew Mom and Dad wouldn’t ask a ton of questions at least the first night, and Theo hadn’t had access to a bathroom for like how long? - but then somehow Stiles and Derek ended up back in the car with them and Stiles kept insisting that it was quicker to drop Liam off and _then_ go get the Jeep so. Liam didn’t get to offer Theo anything. They didn’t get to get any further than they had. It sucked, but he was so tired that he passed out basically immediately after showering and woke up with his cheek pressed against his vibrating phone. Right. It was Monday. He had to go to school.

It wasn’t like Liam ever particularly loved school, but it felt extra pointless after the whole werewolf thing. He didn’t love just learning stuff like Mason did. And lacrosse was over and most of the pack graduated or left, so. School was kind of the thing Liam did to get to the rest of everything else. So it was really freaking inconvenient for Nolan to be here. It got in the way of Liam zoning out, and it also made Liam’s blood start boiling. He kept a handle on it pretty good, but. It was close. Truth be told, he thought about Theo to keep it together. How Theo had looked, telling him he’d regret it.

“Hey,” Mason said at the end of the day, when they were at Liam’s locker. “You kept it together. That’s awesome.”

“I guess so,” Liam said. He had to focus on not slamming his locker shut - it would probably dent, and he didn’t want to remind everybody that he was the freak they tried to kill last week.

“You going running now?” Corey asked.

“Yeah,” Liam said. He definitely needed to run. That was something he started after getting his werewolf juice. He’d go out into the woods and just run around. Like eight miles or something, however long it took for his brain stem to stop telling him to commit murder. It worked, but it felt kind of stupid.

Liam went running every day after school that week. Nolan’s face was too much to look at, even with imaginary Theo trying to help in Liam’s head. At least the other kids who’d tried to kill Liam were dead. But Liam couldn’t even think that without feeling guilty about it, and then being mad he felt guilty when they were the ones who’d tried to _kill him_. That was something he’d need therapy about probably, but after everything with Monroe Liam wasn’t feeling exactly good about therapy either. All he had was running right now.

Scott called on Thursday. He wanted to make sure Liam was okay, which, Liam kind of wasn’t, and then invited him over for a Friday movie night. “Is everybody gonna be there?” Liam asked.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Like, Theo too?”

“Why are you asking about Theo?” Scott asked with interest.

“I mean we’re sort of…” Liam began, and hesitated, and then realized that hesitating also said something so he finished, “He’s not _not_ my boyfriend, so.”

Scott was silent for a second. “Wow,” he finally said. “Would not have seen that coming.”

“Me neither, until last weekend.”

"Huh," Scott said. "Well, yeah I invited him. He said he might swing by."

"Yeah. He doesn't believe that he's actually, like."

"What, part of the pack?" Scott said after a second. "I told him."

"Well yeah, but like." Liam sighed deeply. "Like, you kind of trapped him in his mind, and then told him you didn't trust him for a year so."

Scott hummed. "Mixed messages," he said.

"Right." Though, that was Theo's specialty. He just liked it a lot better when he was giving the mixed messages - he was a baby about getting them. "Okay cool. I'll see you tomorrow."

So that was something to look forward to, at least. Liam thought about texting Theo, to see if he'd come, but then he thought better of it. It didn't seem like a good idea, to all of a sudden start being super all over him when Theo was sleeping in his truck instead of asking anyone for help. And Liam wasn't going to let that keep happening, of course, but again. That was just on the list of things to address in the future of their relationship.

Mason and Corey picked Liam up Friday night to take him over. Liam sat in the middle of the backseat and leaned forward to talk to them. Mason and Corey had planned a weekend of tests to Corey's invisibility, to see if there were limits for what he could make disappear or other ways to catch him. "Sounds fun," Liam said, but even he knew that he wasn't super convincing.

"Sounds useful," Mason said, pretending he wasn't upset. "For the next time we're in trouble. Like what if Corey could sit on top of a car and keep it invisible?"

"Do you think that's likely?" Liam asked.

"Probably not," Corey said.

"We don't even know if someone could nullify his powers with powdered substance in the air or whatever," Mason continued. "That's a major oversight."

"Malia's going to help us," Corey added. "To see how well I can hide from werewolf senses."

"Quantify it," Mason said firmly.

They had the same type of back and forth of all the other couples in the pack, and today it made Liam weirdly sad. Like, not actually sad but just like. When he thought about how much they loved each other his heart kind of hurt. "I love you guys," he said.

"Aw, babe. That means we're being cute," Mason said with a smile at Corey. "Love you too, Leem."

"Alright," Liam frowned. The mood was popped.

"He doesn't like the nickname," Corey said to Mason. "We've been over this."

"Well, it's not that I don't like it, but more like I'm not six anymore," Liam said. "I don't want everybody thinking they get to call me that."

"Whatever," Mason said.

It was not whatever. Liam was trying to make a bunch of people two grades older than him believe he was one of them and also cool. That was not something he could do if _people_ insisted on using his freaking preschool nickname!

He was still fuming when he got out of the car, so it took Mason poking him for Liam to notice Theo’s truck parked across the street from Scott’s. With Theo in it.

“What’s he doing, stalking us?” Mason said.

“He’s here for the party,” Liam said, and got even a little more annoyed. He was waiting for Corey to pile on too, but Corey didn’t. He didn’t say anything, actually. “I’ll go get him,” Liam said then.

“Martyr,” Mason said, so Liam flipped him off as he started walking. He heard Mason and Corey go inside, the door opening and letting out a few snippets of conversation. Stiles was there. Liam kept walking, towards Theo’s truck.

Theo definitely saw him coming, but he didn’t look at Liam until Liam was right up against the door and knocked on it. Then Theo looked at him and said, “Hi.” But that was all he did.

So Liam opened the door, and stood holding it open. “Hi,” he said back. “You gonna get out?”

“No. I’m going to sit here all night.” Theo looked at his steering wheel in an angry kind of way.

Liam liked him probably an unhealthy amount. It was at the point where he found basically everything Theo did kind of cute and/or hot. He ended up accidentally just staring at him for several long seconds while he tried to figure out what exactly to say. Theo looked back at him before Liam had anything. “I’m not actually going to-“ Theo began grudgingly.

“I know,” Liam said. “But I was trying to think of a way to get you to say it.”

“Great job,” Theo said, but it was sarcastic.

“Why haven’t you gone in yet?” Liam asked.

“I was waiting,” Theo said.

 _Why were you waiting?_ That was the question that Liam was definitely going to say next, but he didn’t get the chance to. He looked at Theo again, not in a normal way, but Theo didn’t snap at him about it. He looked Liam in the eyes and waited, again.

There was a lot of stuff that bothered Theo. It was just a thing about him that Liam accepted by now. But knowing that meant knowing it meant something for Theo to not be bothered right now. Like maybe he trusted Liam a little bit, and wasn’t making up horror stories in his brain about how Liam hated him all of a sudden.

“Come on,” Liam said. “We’re going inside.”

“We are?” Theo said skeptically. It looked like maybe he wanted to smile, though.

“Yeah,” Liam said. “And we’re gonna have a great time.” He thought he might take Theo’s hand to pull him out, but Theo didn’t need to be convinced any more. He got out on his own and followed Liam across the street, locking his truck over his shoulder. As they got closer to the door, Liam could smell - gross - everybody inside, all together. It just felt right. This was where they were supposed to be. He didn’t get how Theo could miss that, even without werewolf senses. But Theo hung back, hands in his pockets while Liam knocked on the door, so. He didn’t know. 

Melissa answered the door. “Hi boys,” she said, and yeah she was wary when she looked at Theo but it’s not like she was being unreasonable. Theo had basically killed her son, even if it was a while ago. “Shoes off,” she said. “No mud in the house.”

“Yes ma’am,” Liam said when Theo didn’t say anything. “How are you?” he asked. Couldn’t help it.

“Good, now that things seem to be over,” Melissa said. “You know. Healing. From the bullet wound. Glad my son is alive.”

Liam heard Theo’s heartbeat slow and thought to himself that shit, he should’ve planned on this. Because Theo was the opposite of other people, he’d always chill out when he got scared. It was dumb that nobody else seemed to notice. Liam had really thought Scott was just giving him a hard time but then when it clicked, that Scott didn’t know all the things Theo let slip on accident with his reactions, then Liam had gotten sort of… protective. Which, that hadn’t been a secret. Everybody had noticed him sticking up for Theo all of a sudden. But Liam didn’t know what else to do, really. Theo seemed really fragile almost. Hiding behind a super thin mask. And Liam knew he liked to stand up for people. That was part of himself for forever. There was just something else here, something that made his guts twist up every time Scott accused Theo of lying. Every time Theo remembered wherever Kira sent him and basically stopped breathing. Liam’s mind was made up for him after he noticed that.

So Liam took Theo’s arm, pretending he was off balance, and said, “We are too. It’s been a wild couple years, huh.”

“Yeah,” Theo agreed. “Yup.”

“Thank you for hosting,” Liam said. “You have a lovely home.” And he tugged Theo past her the moment Theo unlaced his very clean and stylish boots. “Be normal,” Liam whispered to him.

“Right. I’ll do that,” Theo muttered back. Then they were around everyone else, and Theo went even more quiet and still than ever.

Okay, so this was something Liam could definitely handle. Not everybody hated Theo. Some people liked him, and Theo could have a good time talking to them, right? Lydia liked him, and Scott loved everybody. Liam got him and Theo involved in a conversation with Lydia and Malia and Jackson right away, but even that didn’t really work because Theo didn’t actually relax even after like twenty minutes. So _then_ Liam had to think of some way to talk to Theo without everybody else but Theo was ignoring all of his attempted hints. It was like last week barely even happened, and what always happened was happening again - things cooling down once Theo had a second to think.

And then Theo tried to sneak out after not even an hour, before they even started the movie, so Liam had to catch him and then chase him outside after saying hurried goodbyes. Theo was opening his truck when Liam caught up to him. “Hey,” Liam said, and tried to pull Theo back so they could look at each other but Theo shook him off.

“What,” he said anyways, pausing.

“Where are you going?” Liam asked, and anticipated Theo not wanting to answer so he added quickly, “Because I need a ride home.”

That earned him a sidelong glance with lips pressed together, but Theo said, “Okay. Then get in.”

And Liam had said that’s what he wanted but he was trying to figure out how to make sure this night didn’t end with Theo dropping him off, again, because Liam wanted so much more than that. Well, he _wanted_ them to have a fun time tonight but that was apparently impossible so this was what Liam wanted now. He was adapting. So he shut Theo’s door and leaned on it. “Hold on,” Liam said. “Though.”

“What,” Theo said. “Do we really need to have a conversation out here, where everyone inside could probably hear us if they wanted?”

Not just everyone inside, but Liam heard the side door open and Melissa come out. Sounded like she had a trash bag - smelled like that too. Liam also heard her pause, her heartbeat getting quicker, and Liam thought maybe this was the best shot they’d get to earn some forgiveness.

“You’ve got to stop acting like everybody wants to hurt you,” Liam said. “I promise that’s not true.”

Theo rolled his eyes hard. “Sure,” he said. “Okay. Yeah I’ve really done a lot to endear myself to Scott’s pack.”

“You’re in it, though!” Liam told him. “You are, I don’t know how you don’t feel it, dude. I’m not lying.”

“I know you’re not lying,” Theo bit out, reluctant.

“Then it shouldn’t be hard to trust me and-“

“I do trust you,” Theo said. Not quietly either, he said it like he was angry it was true. “But that doesn’t mean that…” He scrubbed his hands over his face. “Okay, so I’m in, but I still did what I did. It has nothing to do with trust.”

Liam had to admit, that was sort of a good point. But he wanted Theo to say it what he meant under that, so Scott’s mom could hear. She was still just standing there, listening. “Yeah, but. That won’t mean so much eventually,” Liam said. “You’ve changed a lot.”

“That’s not good enough.”

“You’ve got some serious self-esteem issues.”

“No, it’s not good enough because I think they’re right,” Theo snapped at him, and tried to open the door again.

No. Not yet. Liam held the door shut, though he had to flex to keep it there because Theo was pulling as hard as he could, for real. So Liam kept the door shut and then he also pushed Theo away. Theo’s gaze sharpened, his mouth opened slightly and Liam watched him decide to go for it a third time. So, like, it was Theo’s fault and Liam basically _had_ to kind of slam him into the door. Honestly, if Liam was taking bets he’d say Theo liked it when he did that anyways. So Liam held him there and looked Theo in the eye and said, “I know.”

“Okay.” Theo didn’t expect that.

“But that’s not the way things have to be forever. Things change. You don’t have to just punish yourself for the rest of time.”

That almost got through, Theo almost believed him. But then something about him closed. Like, big metal castle gate lowering sound. “Don’t think Kira would agree with you,” Theo said. “You want a ride home or not?”

“I do,” Liam said. He listened hard - Scott’s mom was sneaking back inside. Okay. He’d have to check in on how that made her feel later. “You still want to take me?” he asked, tuning back in to Theo.

Theo took a deep breath. “Yeah,” he said. “I guess.”

Weirdly, the vibes were almost like, happy, once they were driving. Theo wasn’t tense. Just driving, in the extremely competent way that Liam thought would probably be less impressive if Liam knew how to drive at all. “You remember where I live?” Liam asked after a minute.

“Yeah,” Theo said, and then added, “I do trust you.”

“You said that,” Liam said, and immediately hated that he said that. “I believe you,” he added. “I just… I want you to have a good time.”

When he said that, Theo sort of laughed but it sounded just mostly angry. “Well, don’t get too attached to that idea.”

“I am, though.” Liam looked out the window. “Like I really am.”

“Liam.”

Liam didn’t say anything for a while, and again Theo waited for him. With him. “What did you see, when Kira…” Liam started to ask, and then didn’t know how to say it. Like, calling it an illusion felt like blowing it off. “When she trapped you,” he finally finished.

“Why do you want to get into this?” Theo asked.

“Because you think she’ll never forgive you so it had to be pretty bad,” Liam said. And because he could feel their closeness slipping away and would do almost anything to keep it.

Theo bit down on his lip, and then sort of hesitantly opened his mouth. It took a while, but he got it out. “It was a hospital. Tara was there. She wanted her heart back.”

Tara. Theo’s sister. Liam’s stomach sunk. “Okay.”

“Why?” Theo asked again.

Liam told the truth this time, it seemed only fair. “Because next time we go to Scott’s I want you to have a good time or I don’t want to be there. I’ll talk to Kira.”

“Why! Come _on_ , dude. They’re your friends.”

“Which is how you know how serious I am about this,” Liam said. How much Theo meant to him, he could’ve said, but his throat felt too tight to get it out.

Theo sighed, and was silent for several minutes. That was cool. Liam was fine with silence together. Just sitting with Theo meant something, and even when it didn’t, it was still where he wanted to be. Not in hell, not in mortal danger. Just driving home together.

“I appreciate,” Theo began, and paused. “I appreciate that you’re… you. And, like. You think it’s the right thing to do, to stick up for me or whatever, but. You don’t have to do that. Your friends don’t have to be my friends.”

“I’m not doing this because I think I have to,” Liam said.

“Okay, but-“

“No,” Liam said. “Really. Even if we don’t go next time, I’m gonna talk to Kira about what she did to you. That’s not okay.”

Theo was so starkly silent that Liam tuned into him as closely as he could. To Theo’s heartbeat and breathing and the way he swallowed, the sudden sweat Liam could smell. “I don’t know,” Theo finally said. “I think she probably knew what she was doing.”

“Why?” Liam frowned.

“Because she’s the one with the reality-altering powers, so-“

“Um, she’s still a teenager, and she probably didn’t think about all the implications when she was just trying to stop you from killing Scott.” Again. Liam didn’t need to say that, though, Theo knew that.

“Can you really blame her, though?” Theo asked.

“Yeah, I can.” And Liam hesitated before he said the next thing but he said it anyways. “You thought you were dead, right? I mean, unless I’m wrong.”

Theo went quiet again, so that was a yes. And that was messed up beyond words. Liam liked Kira a lot, or he did before he knew she did this. The future would depend on the conversation they were going to definitely going to have whether or not Theo wanted him to. But it wasn’t right for anybody to torture somebody, even if none of it was ever real. It just wasn’t. Liam was pretty confident about that.

“I wished I was,” Theo said when he talked again, just like he’d said last time they talked about this in the bunker. “But. I don’t know. It was kind of… a complicated thing.”

“You know, when I said you should talk to someone about it I meant me, right?”

Theo didn’t know that. He was silent again, until he parked on the street in front of Liam’s house and then looked at him. “How was I supposed to know that?” he said then, and he sounded really annoyed about it.

“It was pretty clear,” Liam said defensively, his voice high. “I was just… I was being, like.”

“What, because that would be too obvious?”

“To be fair, I thought I was being obvious a lot when it turned out you didn’t get it,” Liam said, and couldn’t help his smile at Theo. God. He liked him so much.

In the darkness, Theo let himself smile back bigger than usual. Like maybe he forgot how Liam could see him just as clear as ever. Or maybe he just needed the plausible deniability. “Okay,” Theo said. “Good point.”

“I’m going to talk to her,” Liam repeated, just to be clear.

“Sounds like I can’t stop you.”

Sounded like he doesn’t want to. “Well,” Liam said. “You want to get your bag and stuff?”

“Why?” Theo frowned.

“Because you’re gonna stay here tonight.”

“No I’m not.”

“Yeah you are, and if I have to drag you inside myself I will. But I don’t want to. That would probably look weird to my mom.”

Theo frowned at him. “I’m fine,” he said.

“I know you’re fine.”

“No, like. I don’t need to sleep here.”

“Okay. But I want you to,” Liam said. And that was exactly the trump card he was hoping it would be. Making it about Liam and what he wanted and not about Theo meant that they didn’t have to argue.

Theo let out a breath. His heart was doing normal things, which Liam thought was probably a really good sign. “Careful,” Theo said. “You’re getting too good at that.”

“Learned from the best,” Liam said. Then he got out of the truck, confident Theo was coming with him.

Which, he did. Theo did some digging around while Liam waited patiently, and then eventually got out with a duffle bag and came around to Liam’s side of the truck. “You’re sure about this?” Theo asked.

“Yeah,” Liam said, and wrapped his hand around Theo’s forearm. “Come on.”

It had been a while since Liam had like, made a new friend and had them over, but it felt the same. Wondering what his house looked like to them, thinking of things to say but not saying them. Liam let go of Theo’s arm to get his shoes off, and Theo followed suit without needing to be told. “My dad’s probably at work,” Liam said. “So I’ll just ask Mom.”

“Okay.”

“Trust me,” Liam said.

“I do,” Theo said again, with a little smile on his face like he didn’t mind being forced to admit it.

Liam knocked his arm against Theo’s, and then led the way to the family room. “Hey Mom,” he said.

“Hi sweetheart.” Mom was on the couch, her feet tucked up under her, reading some magazine with the TV on. She looked up with a smile, over her glasses. “Who’s this?”

“This is my friend Theo, can he stay tonight?”

“Hi,” Theo said awkwardly, with a wave.

Mom’s smile grew. “Hi. Yeah, you know where the air mattress is.”

“Yeah, thanks.” Liam would not be using the air mattress.

“Alright. You need anything to eat?”

“I’m good,” Liam said, and looked at Theo. Theo also shook his head, so Liam added, “Yeah, we’re good. Thanks.” And then, trying not to be in too much of a hurry, Liam took Theo upstairs. His room was on the end, with the bathroom right across from it; Liam pointed. “Mom and Dad have their own bathroom, so you can use mine.”

Theo nodded once. “Okay.”

“Y’know. If you want to shower.”

“Are you saying I smell?” Theo demanded, but it still seemed like he was having a good time with all of this.

“No, but I’m saying if you want to take the hottest longest shower of your life nobody’s gonna stop you. You can just use my shampoo or whatever.”

Theo didn’t like being understood, so the look he gave Liam was skeptical at first and then interested. But like, against his will. “Are you sure?” he said.

“Yeah,” Liam nodded. He didn’t know how to tell Theo that what he wanted more than anything tonight was to give him whatever comfort he’d take without sounding totally pathetic. But that’s what he wanted. So he was happier than anything when Theo nodded and took a bundle of pajamas into the bathroom.

He was in there for a while. Like twenty minutes. Liam was honestly a little worried. He had time to change and throw a bunch of stuff into drawers and in the bottom of his closet. Then he also texted Mason back, who’d asked if they’d gotten back and why Liam had left. _Scott said you went with Theo?? All ok?_

 _Yeah_ , Liam sent. _All good. Theo was just having a bad night._

 _Has he ever had a good one?_ Mason sent, and then the crying laughing emoji.

Liam wasn’t laughing. He put his phone on silent and then put it under his pillow, and lay back to look at the ceiling. An uphill battle was fine. He didn’t really care about that. Liam was great at working through whatever thought it would stop him, even if it was his own stupid brain. But it seemed like almost everybody in the pack didn’t like Theo for a bunch of reasons that were mostly bullshit. Even Mason! Liam’s best friend wasn’t even on his side. Not that Theo wasn’t worth it, or that Liam wouldn’t do it. Oh, he was going to fucking do it. But. It was a bummer.

The bathroom door opened, and Liam got a waft of warm air that smelled like soap before Theo came back in. And it was an established fact that Theo didn’t have any real senses like the rest of them but it wasn’t even two seconds before he went, “What’s wrong?” So he had to have some kind of sense of something.

“Nothing,” Liam said.

“You’re not good at lying,” Theo said, and sat down next to him on the bed gingerly. Liam was actually about to complain to himself about how Theo was acting like they hadn’t like, held each other while close to death before, when Theo reached out and ruffled his hair. Awkwardly. This was obviously not something he had done a lot. Liam loved it. He put his hand on Theo’s leg.

“I’m not trying to,” Liam said. “It’d just be like, plausible deniability. If you don’t really want to know.”

“You live in a world where I’d ask you what’s wrong because I didn’t want you to tell me?” Theo asked.

“Well. Don’t say it like that.”

Theo’s smile was so warm Liam felt himself flushing, so he sat up to try and get some kind of handle on this again. His knee was touching Theo’s leg. “I’m fine,” Liam said. “I’m just. I’m serious, y’know. I’m going to talk to everybody and figure this out.” It was probably too much, to expect Theo to know what Liam meant when Liam hardly knew himself. But lying down had made him so tired that he couldn’t figure out what to actually say.

“Okay, but. Liam,” Theo said. “I don’t expect you to fix everything for me.”

“Right, but-”

“I don’t even _want_ you to.”

“How about this,” Liam suggested after a second. “I’ll stop trying for everything if you tell me when there’s something. Like, for real.” He wanted to reach out and touch him again, felt a pull that was almost magnetic. Out of his control. And this was what Liam couldn’t quite figure out about him and Theo, because he didn’t have a whole lot of reference for it, but. With Theo, he understood attraction as a very literal thing. Not just liking someone, but being drawn to them.

“Sure,” Theo said. “Okay.”

“You sure? You’re doing a lot of emotions talk lately,” Liam pointed out, his voice almost smaller in anticipation of rejection.

But the air in the room was still and thick, undisturbed and fragile, and Theo didn’t say anything like Liam knew he could’ve. No deflection. He just tilted his head at Liam and said, “Almost like I like you or something.”

“Thought you might’ve changed your mind,” Liam said.

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” Because when they were apart, Liam started second guessing everything only to feel stupid about it once they were together again. It was really obvious that Theo liked him when they were anywhere together. But he didn’t want to say it and Theo didn’t push, so. They left it at that.

After Mom came upstairs to say goodnight and shut the door, Liam opened the window. He leaned outside and took a deep breath in.

“What are you doing?” Theo demanded.

“Just checking,” Liam said.

He pulled back in to find Theo frowning at him from the bed. “Werewolf senses, huh,” Theo said. “Can you tell where everyone is?”

“Not everyone. Mason, usually.” Mason wasn’t home yet. Liam shut the window mostly, left it open a crack and got back in bed.

That seemed to freak Theo out, like not that he would ever admit it but his heart slowed down again and that was pretty clear. “Shit,” Liam said. “Sorry.”

“What? Why.”

What was a normal way to say that Theo’s heart tipped him off? Liam couldn’t think of one, so he sort of stuttered something out that ended up making his point anyways and the whole thing ended with Theo demanding, “You’re actually listening to my vitals?” loud enough that Liam thought his mom could probably hear it.

“Is that a surprise for some reason? I figured you would’ve been counting on that,” Liam said with a apprehensive almost-smile on his face, because it didn’t seem like Theo was that upset.

“Yeah,” Theo said. He’d gotten to his feet when Liam was explaining, and was pacing a little bit. “I fucking was counting on it until I figured somebody would’ve known more than they did if they were paying any attention at all.”

“Okay,” Liam said pleasantly. “Yeah. Why did you think I was sticking up for you all of the last year, I knew you weren’t full of shit.”

Theo shook his head. “Wow.”

“Come on, lie down, I’m tired,” Liam said. Well, sort of begged a little bit. “And just tell me what you actually mean.”

“Fine.” It was an anticlimactic way to get Theo finally in bed with him, and kind of funny because Theo was complaining the whole time. “I can’t believe that of everybody, _you’re_ the one actually using your goddamn brain and senses when that’s definitely one of the primary benefits of the whole werewolf thing that doesn’t involve biting or clawing or ass kicking.” Theo sat on the empty side of the bed, like literally just sat there. Liam had to pull the blankets out from under both of them, and it was a couple seconds before Theo took the hint and got actually in.

“I think we’ve been pretty focused on the ass kicking,” Liam said.

“Meathead,” Theo said.

“You don’t have any obvious tells, anyways,” Liam said and turned the light off. He checked his phone then, out of habit more than anything else, and saw the preview of another text from Mason. And _I don’t mean anything by that, he’s just…_

“I don’t?” Theo asked. 

Liam shut his phone off and put it on the nightstand, and then turned halfway to face Theo. “No, not really. It’s subtle. How you slow down, that’s how I can tell.”

“What do you mean?”

A practical demonstration would work better than anything else, really. Liam frowned, and thought, “Okay. How about this. Tell me about your sister.” He waited just a couple seconds, long enough for Theo’s heart to slow noticeably and said, “Sorry. I don’t mean it, you don’t have to, but could you feel that? Your heart went slower.”

Theo, who had paled at the question, remembered how to breathe and then answered. “Uh. No, I… guess I wasn’t aware I was doing that. Jesus.” He scrubbed a hand over his eyes.

“I really don’t want you to answer, I’m sorry,” Liam said, in case that was the problem.

“Good.”

“I’m gonna turn off the light,” Liam said, and Theo didn’t protest so Liam did it and then scooted down the bed to lie down. He could see just fine in the light of the alarm clock, anyways. So he watched Theo just blink a couple times, and then lie down next to him flat on his back and stare at the ceiling a couple times.

“You really invited me over to sleep just to sleep?” Theo said in the silence.

“What else did you think we were going to do?”

“I dunno, I thought you’d have an ulterior motive.”

“Wow.”

“No, I was hoping you would. I like you better when you’re less perfect,” Theo said, and then in the silence he seemed to realize that was further than they usually went.

After a couple more seconds, Liam realized that Theo couldn’t see him smiling, so he turned over to face him and reached out in his direction. He couldn’t quite decide how to do this. So he just ended up sort of awkwardly putting his hand on Theo’s bicep. Or maybe it wasn’t awkward. He couldn’t be sure. “Hey,” Liam said then, on instinct more than anything else. “You like me enough to go somewhere with me? Like. On a date.”

“Like where?”

“I don’t know. Olive Garden?”

Theo was quiet for a while. Liam could feel his pulse in his arm. It didn’t change much. Liam was weirdly flattered. “Okay,” Theo said. “But. I don’t know if I’m…”

“Bi?” Liam suggested after a second. He impressed he could talk with his heart sinking down to the first floor.

“Well. Anything, even. Yeah. The doctors didn’t…” Theo stopped talking and exhaled hard out of his nose. “Are you gonna be weird if I talk about them?”

“No.”

“Well. I just have never…” Liam could fill that in for himself, he could’ve guessed that Theo had never talked about the Dread Doctors before. “Whatever,” Theo said. “It wasn’t a priority for them. They were barely even alive when I knew them, so.”

“So it wasn’t a priority for you? Is that what you’re saying,” Liam said after a pause, trying to be helpful.

Theo bit down on his lip. “Yeah,” he finally said. “I guess. So I don’t know if you’d want to…”

“We don’t have to do anything.”

“I know.” Theo’s tone turned annoyed. “I said yes because I want to.”

“Right but I’m just saying. We don’t have to make out or do… whatever you’re worried about.”

Theo pressed his lips together tightly, and then glanced over in Liam’s direction. He didn’t quite register when they made eye contact - couldn’t see in the dark, Liam reminded himself. “Okay,” Theo said without meaning it, and closed his eyes.

So they were going to sleep now, that was fine. Liam didn’t have ulterior motives, he really didn’t, but going to sleep like this kind of bummed him out. Not mad at each other, but. Sort of less than they were before. “Good night,” Liam whispered, and turned onto his stomach to actually fall asleep. He wiggled one arm under his pillow, kicked a leg free of the blankets, got comfortable and settled in. And then after he’d been still for a while, Theo moved. Liam felt a cold arm over his shoulders, and an exhale hit his cheek and stirred his hair. Theo slept holding him, soaking up warmth the whole night. So that felt a little better, even without a concrete answer.

They didn’t pick the conversation up the next morning. Didn’t really get the chance. First they were just sort of waking up, and then Liam went downstairs to get coffee and Theo kept sleeping. Then Theo came downstairs too, when Mom was making breakfast, and then they were eating, and all of a sudden Theo was putting his shoes on and heading for the door with his bag and Liam hadn’t gotten to clarify if Theo’s answer to the whole date question had been more of a yes or no in the end.

Like an idiot, Liam followed Theo out to his car again. “Hey,” he said to Theo’s back.

It was gratifying, how immediately Theo turned around for him. “What?”

He meant to get an answer. Yes or no, to the date thing. That was the plan. “Do you text? Or like.”

“Why?” Theo asked.

“Because I like talking to you. I want to do it more than once a week.”

He couldn’t look at Theo directly to see his reaction, but he saw peripherally that Theo’s shoulders fell a little. Like relaxing, not disappointment. Hopefully. “Oh.”

“Yeah. I’ve just sort of noticed that we like. Cool off. And I don’t want to do that. Because-“

Theo didn’t surprise him, but he did walk quickly back to wrap Liam in a hug. And that was wonderful, that was exactly where Liam wanted to be sort of forever. He squeezed Theo tight. Weird - Theo was cold like he had been last night, cool to the touch. Maybe that was the lizard thing.

“I’m not great at texting,” Theo said. Sort of into Liam’s hair, which tickled.

“The whole raised by zombie doctors thing, huh?” Liam asked sympathetically.

“Yeah.”

“Well, you have a smartphone right?” Liam asked.

Theo pulled back with his hands on Liam’s shoulders and looked him in the eye. “You don’t drive,” he said.

“I don’t,” Liam agreed.

“I could come get you from school. If you want.”

Liam blinked. “What day?”

“Any day you want.” Theo was getting uncomfortable.

“Well, like. Most of the time I go to the woods after school, would you want to…” Liam began hesitantly.

Theo frowned. “Why do you go to the woods?”

“To run… just. To run around,” Liam answered. “So I don’t eviscerate my classmates. Even though they tried to kill me.”

“Who? Like who?”

“Nolan.”

“Nolan’s still in your classes? That little shit that fucking _shot us_?”

“Yeah, and I’m trying to be nice about it, but. I mean.” Liam felt his face going hot. “Well. You know what almost happened. And, I still feel… the same. So. I just go run to make sure I’m too tired to actually pull his guts out and eat them. Or whatever my instincts are telling me to do. I don’t really want to know if it’s something else.”

Theo squeezed Liam’s shoulders to make him stop. “I’ll come get you,” he said. “Tell me what door he comes out through.”

“I think he parks in the side parking lot,” Liam said. “Got the fancy pass. Since he’s rich.”

“Okay. I’ll see you there on Monday then,” Theo said. It almost felt like he’d lean in for a kiss, but then he didn’t. He just let go, and went back to his car. “And thanks,” he yelled once he was around on the drivers side. Liam couldn’t see him, but he thought he might be able to hear a smile.

“Any time!” Liam called back. Like, normally and calmly and he definitely didn’t realize that he hadn’t gotten clarification on whether or not they’d be going on that date or not until Theo was six streets away.

Well. Okay. He’d ask Monday.

Monday got off to a rough start, though, when Mason came to pick him up in the morning and wanted to talk about Theo. Corey wasn’t with him. “So,” Mason said when Liam shut the door. “I get the sense I pissed you off.”

“What gave you that impression?” Liam said, with an edge in his voice he wasn’t exactly trying to hide.

“Maybe how you didn’t text me back all weekend? What’s the deal, man?”

Liam buckled his seatbelt as Mason reversed out of the driveway, which also gave himself time to figure out what to say. “I just…” Liam finally said. “You know he’s my friend.”

“I actually didn’t know you were so serious about it,” Mason said.

“I didn’t know I had to be,” Liam said. “You have a problem with him?”

“No,” Mason said. “Not exactly.”

“Does Corey talk about him?”

“No. Even though I’ve tried. Are _you_ going to talk about him?”

Liam was less pissed off the longer they talked, so that helped. “I mean, sure. I just think it’s pretty obvious that he’s been on our side for like a year, so. I don’t understand why everyone’s still treating him like shit. He took out that thing, a couple weeks ago, for starters.”

“Sure,” Mason said. “But he also killed his pack and tried to kill most of us. I’m not saying that outweighs your stuff, but. It’s part of the whole thing. Like, it’s gotta be.”

“Yeah,” Liam said. “He did all of that because he was scared of not being powerful enough. So the way to make him stop being scared is to make sure he doesn’t feel safe with his pack. _That_ makes sense.”

Mason looked over at him. “You’re really defending him? He tried to get you to kill Scott. Hell, he _did_ kill Scott. And Hayden.”

“I know,” Liam said tightly.

“Okay so how can you be like this?”

“I don’t know, Mason, you tell me what you’d do if somebody who wasn’t a great person saved your life a couple times. And then kept doing that, even after he thought Kira put him in hell for however many months.” That came out angrier than he meant it to.

Mason was quiet for a couple seconds. “What?”

“To which part?”

“Obviously the hell part, what is that supposed to mean?”

“When she put him in that illusion, he thought he was in hell but he didn’t say anything because he figured we all had agreed he deserved it, so.” Liam waited for Mason’s reaction and didn’t get any. In the silence, though, more kind of spilled out. “And he wouldn’t even tell me about it for the longest time, because he thought that it wasn’t a big deal and he did deserve it anyways.”

“What was hell to him?” Mason asked.

“His sister ripping his heart out over and over.”

“Holy shit.”

“Yeah.”

Mason shook his head in disbelief, turned them into the school parking lot. “Jesus,” he said. “Well that explains a couple things.”

“Yeah. He’s gonna pick me up today, also.”

“Okay.” Mason parked without saying much more, which Liam couldn’t decide if that was a good or bad thing. Seemed good. Mason being quiet meant he was thinking things through. And sure enough, when Liam joined Mason on his side of the car, Mason had something to say. “Alright. That does change things.”

“It does,” Liam agreed.

“I’m not saying I’ve forgotten the other stuff,” Mason said, and they started walking towards the school.

“Me neither,” Liam said. “But. It’s just like. And I’ll tell you when I get him to open up about it more, too, but it’s slow. He feels real guilty about everything.”

“Okay. I mean, good. But.”

“Right.”

“Starting to see why you’re so defensive about this.”

That was Mason’s way of apologizing. Liam looked over at him and smiled. “Okay. Good. It really sucked to feel like everybody thought I was crazy.”

“You’re not crazy,” Mason said, and clapped his hand on Liam’s shoulder. And that felt good, it felt like maybe Liam could keep himself together today. His best friend was on his side, that would change everything for sure.

Except… it didn’t change anything at all. Liam saw Nolan for the first time in psych, which was second period, and for all of ten seconds Liam thought he was going to be cool about it. This was Nolan, he was just another teenager and a full-grown adult had been telling him what to do. But Liam’s heart didn’t agree, it sped up and he started breathing harder and everything because this was Nolan, and he’d broken Liam’s orbital bones and jaw and nose on this stupid linoleum floor with a bunch of other guys who were dead now.

Biology was even harder. As hard as it had been every time, honestly. Just, things weren’t getting any easier. Liam had been expecting them to get easier at some point, instead of having panic attacks for the rest of the school year and zoning out and not having a single note written down at the end of the period. He almost forgot about Theo, what with everything. Or he did forget, every few minutes, and then remembered again and remembering did help with the whole keeping it together thing. Still, it was more of a surprise than it should’ve been when the day was over and Liam got to head out the doors knowing Theo would be on the other side of them. Or maybe surprise wasn’t the right word. More like a relief.

Theo was parked at the curb, leaning against the driver’s side door with his arms crossed. When he made eye contact with Liam, his heart slowed down significantly. Like enough for Liam to think it was maybe intentional.

“Hey,” Theo said when Liam was close enough.

“Hi.” Liam hoped his smile wasn’t stupidly big. “Glad you came.”

“Of course I came,” Theo said. He sounded offended.

Not a ton of people came out the side door. Most people went out the auditorium doors, or the front doors by the art wing, or even out the teachers’ parking lot doors. So there weren’t a lot of people seeing them together but Liam didn’t particularly care anyways. He almost wished there were more people seeing them. Knowing he was like, spoken for.

“Okay,” Liam said. “Well. Thanks.”

“How was your day?” Theo asked.

Liam felt lightheaded, and was very grateful Theo couldn’t hear his heartbeat. He came to a stop in front of Theo, adjusted his grip on his backpack strap. “Good,” he said. “Uh. Great.”

“Somehow I doubt that,” Theo said. He was watching him closely.

“What, that obvious?”

“Well, you can’t lie any better than you could three days ago, so.” Theo’s attention caught on something behind Liam then, and when he blinked his eyes went acid yellow. Liam inhaled deeply, and smelled Nolan. Great. “Keep walking,” Theo said at Nolan.

“Don’t,” Liam said uncomfortably, because now he could smell Nolan’s fear and that was just a bummer.

“Stop me, then,” Theo said.

“Let’s just go, I want to be back before dark,” Liam said, and Theo let Liam open the truck door and push him in. Liam got in too, he slung his book bag in at his feet and buckled in as Theo started the engine and menacingly revved it before pulling away. And the whole time, Liam was just thinking about how they were together around people. Oh my god. That shouldn’t feel like as much of a big deal as it did. It never felt like this much with Hayden. As much as he loved her, he was over her by now. But maybe it was the gay thing, Liam had never really gotten this serious with a guy before.

“Well, looked like we scared him,” Theo said.

“We didn’t need to-” Liam began.

“Did he or did he not break half your bones while your class watched?”

And his teacher, too. “Yeah,” Liam said.

“And he didn’t leave town after that? I’ll scare the shit out of him every fucking time I see him.”

That made Liam’s face heat up, for whatever reason. “I don’t know. I feel kind of bad about it, I guess,” he said. “But you looked cool.”

“Good,” Theo said. “‘Cause now my eyes are burning.”

“Whoa. Is that normal?”

“I don’t know.”

“You could ask Jackson,” Liam suggested, and got a noncommittal sound in response. “I don’t want you to hurt yourself for nothing.”

“Please,” Theo scoffed. So that was sort of that.

They changed into running clothes on their sides of the truck, once Theo parked off the road somewhere deep in the woods. No one was around for a mile. The air was undisturbed and just smelled like dirt and stuff, and still Liam felt so definitively not alone that it almost felt like he was performing for an audience.

“You don’t have to run with me,” Liam said.

“Oh, I’m pretty sure I won’t be running with you,” Theo said matter-of-factly. “Given that you guys can run a three minute mile if you want to. But I’ll run behind you for as long as I can.”

So Liam ended up doing sort of suicides, running a few minutes away from Theo and then back towards him, jogging at his side until he couldn’t stand going that slow and taking off again. They got tired at about the same rate that way, and then walked back to Theo’s truck at a normal speed, just talking. Liam realized a couple things, then. Or one main thing.

There was a real possibility that if he kept seeing Theo every day, he’d just keep liking him more. At this rate, Liam would probably love him in a couple weeks, if he didn’t love him already. His heart hurt just thinking about it. Him. And they hadn’t even been on a date yet, which probably made him closer to crazy than he wanted to be. So it would be fine and probably even good, to not see Theo for a while after that. So when Theo asked if he should come back tomorrow, Liam very maturely told him he did not need to. They needed that time to cool off, after all, or else Liam would start picking baby names or something.

It made a lot of sense in Liam’s mind, but when he told Mason about that the next morning, that he’d need rides home after all, Mason gave him some side eye. “What?” Liam demanded.

“Since when are you allergic to talking about how you feel?” Mason asked, like he was waiting for the chance. “Why aren’t you telling him exactly all of this?”

“Because he hates it.”

“Really?”

“What do you mean, really? He’s sort of a sociopath raised by a bunch of medical kink freaks,” Liam said, which was mostly a joke but also not really one. He fiddled with the zipper of his book bag in his lap. “I don’t want to freak him out.”

Mason rolled his eyes at Liam. “Oh, please dude.”

“What!”

“You haven’t even told me even close to everything about the two of you, but even I can see that Theo does literally whatever you ask him to. He was ready to die for you, I think he’d talk to you about how you feel.”

“Okay, yeah but.” It was one thing to be trapped in a hospital with a guy and save each other’s lives. But it was totally a whole other thing to walk up to somebody and open up with no magical death cowboys forcing your hand. It’d be pretty easy for Theo to brush that off. It would make a lot of sense, too.

Liam didn’t realize he wasn’t answering until Mason broke the silence by talking again. “Does he have somewhere to stay yet?”

“Uh, no. I don’t think so.”

“You mind if I work on that?” Mason asked.

That was kind of a funny way to put it. “What, like it’s homework?” Liam asked with an amused type of frown.

“Well, I’ll be asking Stiles and Lydia for help with it, so. Yeah, a lot like homework,” Mason said. They were at a red light, so he looked over at Liam closely. “Really, though. Is that okay? I don’t want to…”

“No, yeah,” Liam said. “I obviously don’t have any good ideas, so. But he’s, like. I don’t think he wants people to just feel bad for him.”

“Then maybe he shouldn’t be living in his truck,” Mason said. A sarcastic kind of joke that Liam felt bad about laughing at but did laugh at anyways.

He should’ve asked Mason for help from the beginning, that was the real takeaway here. Like, first of all Mason was the smartest person Liam knew, but also second of all he had solutions soon. In two weeks basically. But they had the academic decathlon that first weekend, which Liam was planning on skipping until Mason harassed him into going. It was fun, when they actually did it. Corey was there too, and the three of them got to have fun together like they hadn’t really gotten to do for a while. It felt normal. Liam was having a great time. And like, he wanted to talk to Theo, but he did still think time apart probably was a good thing for them. Especially since he was the only one pushing for them to see each other more, so. Liam could take a hint.

Mason texted him on Thursday night. _Hey I’m omw to pick you up_

 _Where are we going?_ Liam texted back, and went downstairs to find his shoes.

_Brain trust meeting about Theo. He’ll be there too._

So Liam was expecting like five people - Theo, him, and then Mason and Lydia and Stiles. But, when they pulled into the taco place parking lot, it wasn’t just them. Scott was there too, bickering with Stiles. And Derek was standing, stiff and disapproving, discussing something with Malia.

“Oh boy,” Liam said. At least Theo was not in his car. He was even standing vaguely near everyone, facing Lydia but not speaking to her. Malia and Lydia had their hands linked as they ignored each other. Liam wanted to do that with Theo, to be connected as they did whatever they had to do. Fuck. It was probably a really good thing they’d had a break, if this was how Liam was already thinking.

Mason made a beeline for Stiles, and Liam went straight for Theo. He was just walking towards him and then all of a sudden he thought he was going to hug him. Or something. Just because he couldn’t help it. So Liam didn’t do that, and he just said, “Hey.”

“Did you know about this?” Theo asked.

“No,” Liam said, which was mostly true. It wasn’t quite dark outside yet, but the sun was setting and the air getting a little cooler. Liam looked at Theo a few seconds at a time, trying to take in every detail. He was wearing a hoodie zipped most of the way up. His hair was getting shaggy. His hands were in his pockets.

“Hey,” Scott said a little louder, to get the attention of the group. “Let’s get something to eat and then we’ll get down to business.” He led the way in. Lydia and Malia were close behind; Malia seemed super eager to get something to eat, judging from how much she had to say about the menu.

“I’m paying,” Derek said, and followed them.

“He uses that like a weapon,” Stiles said to Mason. “Wielding it, beating us with it, making us do whatever he wants.”

“You’re just mad because you want Baja Blast,” Liam told him, and caught Theo smiling.

“You’re goddamn right I’m mad. It’s a delicacy,” Stiles said, but then he held the door for everybody. “How’s high school treating you?” he asked Liam as they got in line. It felt like when Liam’s parents asked, honestly.

“Fine,” Liam said. “No hate crimes, so.”

Stiles shook his head. “High standards in Beacon Hills. You hear that?” he asked Derek, who was waiting and letting them all pass him to get in line. Waiting for Stiles, Liam realized. “No hate crimes. Maybe we did something right after all.”

“It’s been two weeks,” Derek said. “Give it time.”

Which was probably a joke but Liam didn’t think it was very funny. He moved forward in the line, leaned hard on the little divider and told himself he was not going to break it. Though, everything in here was old enough that he could probably get away with saying it was an accident. Unless someone in here knew who he was. What he was.

He startled at Theo’s hand on his shoulder, it was colder than he expected. “Hey,” Theo said. “Nolan’s leaving you alone?”

“Yeah,” Liam said. “Just seeing him though, is sort of.”

“Yeah,” Theo said. “I get it.”

Liam was so wrapped up in not paying too much attention to Theo’s hand still on his shoulder that it took a second to realize what that could mean like. Oh. Did Theo feel that way with Kira? That was probably something they should talk about. Unless Mason already realized it, and that’s why Scott had shown up alone.

“So, Theo,” Scott said, turning back from his spot near the front of the line. “What are your intentions for my son?”

Theo frowned at Scott. “What?”

His confusion was the only thing keeping Liam from trying to impale himself on a plastic knife. This was not what he wanted. “Cut it out,” he said to Scott.

“Oh yes, I’ve been meaning to ask,” Stiles said. Fuck. They were surrounded. “When are you gonna make an honest man out of our boy here? He’s very delicate, you must be gentle with him.” Liam whacked Stiles’ shoulder almost as hard as he could, and Stiles yelped. “Jesus!”

Unfortunately, though, it seemed like Theo was connecting some dots. “Intentions,” he repeated slowly.

Scott was still smiling. “Intentions,” he agreed. “Since a little bird told me you might be… y’know.”

“Hold on,” Mason said, with growing interest. “What bird?”

“Do not,” Liam told him.

Theo looked at him then, and Liam had to look back. He couldn’t read Theo’s face, could barely pick his heart out from everyone else’s, but he got a handle on it just in time to realize Theo wasn’t upset, wasn’t in the frozen still place that meant he was panicked. “You’re telling people we’re dating now?” Theo asked, and there was a smile in the corner of his mouth that Liam was pretty sure no one else would catch.

“Well, it was more of a metaphor,” Liam said, trying to sound calmer than he was. Because he was still sort of panicking. So much for playing things cool.

“I can’t believe my boyfriend doesn’t know what a metaphor is,” was all Theo said in response, and the group around them erupted into a lot of sounds and shoving. Except Derek, who stayed standing where he was, arms crossed. Derek didn’t really get excited a lot.

“Well,” Stiles said in a normal tone of voice. “That’s what you get for dating werewolves who haven’t graduated high school. I should know.”

“We’re not dating,” Derek said without missing a beat. “First of all. But also, I got my GED.”

“I made him get his GED,” Stiles said in an undertone to Mason, and then louder to everyone else he said, “And I wasn’t talking about you.”

“Wait, hold on,” Liam frowned. “I’m still in high school, that’s the only reason I haven’t graduated.”

Theo smiled at him. “Likely story.”

From the front of the line, Scott spoke up again. “I approve, for the record.” Said in that sincere way that made it totally obvious he was saying exactly what he meant. And Scott wasn’t Liam’s dad at all, but his approval did mean something, in the end.

It meant something to Theo too. He’d been fine for most of that conversation, but when Scott said that Theo went still. Scott didn’t notice - he was up now, and had a lot of ordering decisions to be made. But Lydia did, she smiled at them as Malia pulled her into a tighter hug. Lydia pointed at Theo and made a wide-eyed face. And like, Liam appreciated the help but he did have it handled. Whatever, though. Mason liked to help like that too, Liam could take it as the nice gesture it was. Everybody just wanted him to be happy.

“Boyfriend, huh,” Liam said to Theo.

“Yeah,” Theo said. “I didn’t make that super clear before, did I?”

“Not really.”

And then, casually and like he did it all the time, Theo wrapped his arm around Liam’s shoulders and pulled him closer. Liam couldn’t breathe at first but once he could he reached up and linked their fingers together too. It was just easy as that.

“Well,” Theo said. “I hope this is clearer.”

So much clearer. Liam couldn’t exactly remember why they were here, or who exactly was here but then it really registered that he was doing this in front of Scott, and Mason, and everybody else and the stakes were higher than ever, for Liam to not mess this up by being clingy. They’d need to talk about this for real, once whatever this meeting was was over. But right now, it was enough that they were holding hands.

They separated to order, and then all waited together by the fountain drinks. Stiles had gotten a cup for water he was unrepentantly filling with Coke, even though Scott was very disappointed in him. “Do not get me started on the-“ Stiles began, but Scott finished for him.

“The mark up of fountain drinks at fast food places, yes I know.” Scott sighed, and then stole Stiles’ cup to have a drink from it.

“Each cup probably costs like a nickel to fill. Fountain drinks are the real profit margins,” Stiles said to generally sort of everyone else but also Derek, who was turning all the plastic-wrapped spoons to be the same way in their little cup.

Derek paused and looked up at Stiles. “This is a family-owned restaurant,” he said. “You’re stealing from them.”

That was shaping up to be a great argument, but Theo poked Liam then to get his attention. Theo was leaning against a wall, and Liam was almost close enough to be standing between his feet. “You tell anyone else we’re dating?” Theo asked, with a little bit of a smile on his face. “Just, you know. So I can keep my story straight.”

“No,” Liam said, a little embarrassed. “I didn’t even really tell Scott that we were, I was just.”

“It’s fine,” Theo said firmly. “I just thought… I don’t know.” He was thinking, and Liam took his hand while he thought. Because he could now, because they were dating. That made Theo smile, a totally reluctant kind of smile that he couldn’t help and maybe didn’t want to. “Okay,” Theo said. “Well. It feels dumb to say this now, but I can’t tell sometimes. What’s you being a good person, versus…”

“I’m not that good of a person.”

Theo didn’t agree with that, but he didn’t argue the point. “Question,” he said even softer, and Liam leaned in to hear it. “Would you let me pick you up again. Like, a regular thing?”

“Sure,” Liam agreed. He thought they might kiss now, but again they didn’t. Just looked at each other with smiles, and then their food was ready.

All of them crammed around the one table to eat, even though it only had room for six. Malia sat with Lydia between her legs, sharing the seat, and Derek stayed standing. So nobody needed Liam to volunteer to share a seat with Theo, but he almost wished he did anyways. Again, attraction. He almost couldn’t help but reach out. At least eating kept his hands busy.

“So,” Lydia said after she was finished with her fries. “We’ve done some thinking, and we’ve got a solution. Theo, you’re not going to keep living in your truck.”

“Am I not?” Theo said, almost pleasantly.

“No,” Lydia said, and Malia shook her head.

“You’re gonna stay in one of Derek’s apartments,” Stiles said with his mouth full. “He has like four buildings. He’s a landlord. Class traitor.”

“I am not,” Derek said. “I just own buildings.”

Lydia glared at them, and addressed Theo. “You won’t have to pay rent. There’s some furniture in there. You can stay until you figure some things out.”

“Okay,” Theo said. “What’s the catch.”

“No catch,” Scott said. “We’re here for you. That’s it.” 

“There won’t be a homeless teenage werewolf while I’m around,” Derek said. “It’s also that.”

Malia laughed, one of her deep weird laughs. “No,” she said. “You’re the only homeless werewolf teen allowed.”

“That was in the past,” Derek grumbled.

Theo was eating and ignoring them now, and Liam looked over at him. “No catch,” he repeated. “Really.” And Theo trusted him, so he believed it.

He didn’t trust anyone else, that was the thing. Everybody offered help to get him to move him in, but Theo was reserved for most of the process. Didn’t talk much. Didn’t accept help from anyone but Liam and, even then only barely.

On move-in day, Malia showed up. Just appeared in the door and stared. “Oh,” she said.

“Hi,” Liam said.

“Are you lost?”

“No,” Liam said. “We’re moving Theo in.”

“Oh.”

“Why are you here?”

“Sperm donor lives one floor up,” Malia said, and Liam made the face he always did at that title. "Visiting him.”

Liam frowned. “Is he okay?”

Theo came out of the bedroom then, to see who Liam was talking to. “Oh,” he said when he saw Malia. “Hi.”

“Hello. Yeah, he’s fine. Just being dramatic about the wolfsbane.”

“Was it the yellow stuff?” Liam asked.

Malia nodded. “But he’s a grown man, he’s fine.” She looked at Theo, then. “Huh. Convenient, to have you and Peter both here. If someone betrays us, we know where to look.”

“Ha,” Theo said, like actually said the word and didn’t laugh, and Liam didn’t say anything. He wasn’t sure what to do.

“Now hold on,” Malia said, and took a step into the apartment. “You say things like that all the time,” she said, specifically to Liam. “And everybody thinks it’s funny.”

“Well, we give him pity laughs,” Theo said.

“Alright,” Liam frowned.

“Why isn’t it funny when I say it?” Malia pressed.

And Theo looked right at her, shifted his weight back to stand a little taller and said, “You really want to know?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s funny because I know he’s joking,” Theo said.

Malia nodded seriously, taking in this new information. “Do you want to make out with me next?” she said. “So I can make these jokes?”

Liam looked from her to Theo, and found Theo smiling. “Now that,” Theo said, “is a joke.”

“I’m working on it,” Malia said. “I missed a lot of the formative sarcasm years, I think. Well, and Lydia says so.”

“Lydia would know,” Theo said.

“Yeah,” Malia said with a smile. “She knows a lot.” And she came further in then, like they’d invited her. “This is nice.”

“Thanks,” Theo said.

“And I was joking, before.”

“Great.” Liam was really learning what Theo’s various deadpan tones meant, so he was pretty sure this one meant that Theo was having a good time and pretending not to. That was one of the most popular ones. “You want to give it another shot?” Theo asked then.

Malia nodded again, just once. “Give me a sec.” She put her hands in her pockets. While they waited, Theo held his hand out to Liam and used Liam’s hand to pull him closer. “Okay,” Malia said after some serious thought. “How about this. Which makes you crazier, watching your whole family get burned alive or watching your sister die and stealing her heart?”

“I’ll have to try the other one some time and find out,” Theo said, which made Malia snort. That was what she’d been looking for.

“Okay. See you later,” Malia said, and left as suddenly as she came.

“Well,” Liam said. “That was fun.”

“It was something.” Theo picked up the box he must’ve been coming to get, and took it back into the bedroom.

Liam followed, not letting him get away with ending the conversation like that. “It’s good,” he suggested. “That you’re getting along a little more. Right?”

“Sure, if it’s real.” Theo tossed the box on his bed and started pulling shoes out, lining them up near the wall of his closet. Liam just watched him, long enough that Theo paused and looked back at him and said, “What. What are you thinking?”

“I’m thinking that Malia literally doesn’t know how to lie,” Liam said. “Do you really think it might not be real?”

“No,” Theo said. “I don’t know. I’m worried.”

“At some point you’ve gotta let go of that,” Liam said.

“Says who?” Theo said. But then he paused, on his way back through the door, to wrap his arm around Liam and kiss him. “Okay,” he said. “I’m trying.”

It was the saying that meant something. Theo was getting better at it. “I know,” Liam said, trying not to smile. “And I’m here to help.”

“I know. Shut up,” Theo said with annoyance, and kissed him again.

So Liam’s not exactly covert operation to get Theo comfortable with the pack was ahead of schedule. Malia was a surprise - Liam hadn’t planned on working on her yet. His priority was figuring out what to say to Kira. He had been working on how to approach that with Mason, since Mason was a nerd like her and was good at making arguments logical and not emotional. Now Liam just waiting for the right time to say something to her. He’d been waiting for a couple weeks, and there was no good opening. He saw her with Scott and couldn’t ask to talk just the two of them, or they’d be doing a pack thing and it’d be weird to interrupt them and be like, hey can I just talk to Kira. It was awkward anyways, though, to be hanging out and just looking at her and thinking about how she’d basically tortured Liam’s boyfriend.

“Hey,” Stiles said at one point. It was him and Scott and Liam and Kira, hanging out at the park. Stiles was sitting on top of the picnic table the rest of them were sitting around, shoving food in his mouth. Taco Bell this time, because he made a point to get it if he was driving. Actually there was so much food in his mouth that Liam missed what Stiles said the first time, so Stiles poked him and said again, “Hey.”

“What.” Liam was on Twitter, not paying a ton of attention to Stiles.

“Why are your vibes off? What’s up.”

Liam frowned up at him. “What?”

“Scott said you haven’t had a normal heartbeat in like three months, so what’s going on with that.” Stiles said it as like, simply factual.

“What?” Liam looked at Scott, who seemed like he was in the middle of regretting something intently.

“Look,” Scott said. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“Well, how did you mean it?” Liam demanded, and Stiles made sound of support for him. Kira just looked between everyone, quietly paying attention. She had juiced up senses too, she probably could tell Liam wasn’t sounding normal and he thought he’d been so good with the whole secrecy thing.

Scott didn’t know how to handle this, so he ended up telling the truth. “I’m just saying, you seem pretty nervous most of the time, and I just wanted to make sure you were okay. I didn’t mean for Stiles to bring it up in the middle of nowhere,” he said, running a hand through his hair. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” Stiles said in a high voice. “I’m doing exactly what you asked me to. You didn’t give timing directions.”

“Well,” Scott began.

Stiles didn’t let him finish. “Look,” he said. “Simple as this. Your father and I are very worried about you.”

Liam dropped his head onto the able. “Oh my god.”

“And if there’s something you’re keeping from us, you should probably just tell us, so we can help you figure it out. What about your boyfriend, didn’t fixing his housing situation help at all?” Stiles asked, and it sounded like he’d leaned in closer.

“Yeah,” Liam said. “It helped. I’m fine, though, I don’t need anything.”

“That’s a lie,” Scott said immediately.

“Is it Theo? Has he done something dastardly?” Stiles asked.

Okay, that was pretty annoying. Liam had some intense sympathy for Theo, all of a sudden, and the year he spent trying to talk everyone into trusting him. Scott wasn’t going to drop this, and Stiles had never dropped anything in his whole life, so Liam just answered. “It’s not Theo, and I’m kind of pissed you’re still acting like he’s the problem when what you did to him was away more messed up.”

“What are you talking about?” Stiles demanded.

“I’m talking about Kira making him wish he was dead,” Liam said, and then couldn’t unsay. Maybe he shouldn’t even want to, but. Whatever. He couldn’t. He sat up then, to see how everyone responded.

Scott looked at Kira, and Stiles did too. Liam looked at the table. “Okay, I don’t totally know what you’re talking about,” Scott said.

“I’m talking about how the illusion you put him in was torture,” Liam said, directly to Kira, because he couldn’t do this halfway. “And I’m trying to give you the benefit of the doubt and think you didn’t know what you were doing, but okay, if you want to push it then yeah, that’s hard to be cool with.”

Kira wasn’t embarrassed at all. She met Scott’s eyes, and Stiles’, and then finally Liam’s. “I sent him where he thought he deserved to be,” she said. “That didn’t have to be torture.”

“Bullshit,” Liam said without hesitation. “Unless you really thought he was a sociopath, but you’ve got the same senses I have so I don’t know how you could.”

“He was trying to kill at least half of us,” Kira said. “Sorry I didn’t spend that much time thinking about him.”

“Okay, so you _were_ mad at him,” Liam said.

“I had about fifteen seconds to get him out of the way.”

This was why Liam didn’t want to do this until the time was right. And now they were in a situation where he couldn’t pretend she’d convinced him but definitely did want to stop having this conversation, so. He put his head back down on his arms, and tried to think if he could run away before Scott would catch him.

“Wait,” Stiles said. “Torture how?”

And that’s when Liam decided he’d leave after all. “I don’t know,” he said. “Whatever. I have to… I forgot a thing.” And he stood up. They were all looking at him now, and Liam wanted to like, shoot into the sky and never be seen again.

“Hold on,” Stiles said.

“Can’t. I’m late.”

“For the thing you just remembered?”

Liam began walking away quickly. “Yes,” he said over his shoulder, and then, “Bye.” And then he tried to shut his ears off so he couldn’t hear them whispering. This was an awful idea. He texted Theo. _Hey can you come pick me up at the park rn? I’ll be on the playground side_. Playground was a good place to wait. He could stand at the top and breathe deep. But when he got to the playground, he kicked the monkey bars and dented one of the supports really bad so then Liam thought maybe he should stay away from items he could break. But he could break most things, so then he ended up sitting in the middle of the mulch and focusing on breathing and not letting himself shift the way he could feel his body wanting to. He didn’t want to shift. It was so stupid, that he couldn’t just get pissed off without trying to destroy the world around him.

“Hey kiddo,” someone said behind him, and Liam looked up with his vision blurred by the werewolf vision thing. He blinked a couple times, and saw Stiles coming up, his Jeep parked in the lot nearby. “Hey,” Stiles said again. “Deep breaths, okay?”

“I’m fine, I’ve got a ride home,” Liam told him.

“Wow, very convincing. I’ll definitely leave you alone now,” Stiles said with sarcasm even Liam could hear. “Come on, unclench and breathe. And take one of these.” Stiles tossed him a protein bar.

“What is this for?” Liam asked, already unwrapping it. He had a bite, and then lay flat in the mulch as he finished it.

Stiles sat down next to him, a little ways away. “Works without fail,” he said. “The wolf part of you is easily distracted by food. Discovered this when Derek ate his way through a buffet when he tried to go out with me and my work friends and they said something that I totally missed but somehow made him mad enough to almost lose it.” There was a smile in his voice.

“Anger issues aren’t like. A good thing,” Liam said, aware of the irony.

“I know,” Stiles said. “We both know. But. It was kind of funny, too. But only because I know he won’t kill any innocents.” There was a brief pause. Liam finished his protein bar. “And that wasn’t a dig at Theo, also, just in case it sounded like it. Though I realize that pointing that out probably makes it sound like it definitely was.”

“Well,” Liam said. “If it was, you could just say so. Not like I haven’t heard that before.”

Stiles huffed out a gentle kind of laugh. “Yeah, guess that’s a good point. We haven’t exactly been easy on him.”

“Not quite.” It was getting easier to breathe. Maybe the food did calm him down. “I really don’t need any help. Theo’s coming to pick me up, so. You can go. Thanks, though.”

“Wow. A brush off, so classy.” Stiles didn’t move.

“I mean it.”

“I know you mean it, and I am politely ignoring it. You’re not going to shrug this off. We’re going to talk about it, so I can help you make your case next time this comes up,” Stiles said firmly, and sat back with his weight on his hands so he could look up at the sky. “Scott is going to hear out Kira and we’re going to settle this.”

Liam kept his eyes on the clouds too. “Is he mad at me?”

“No, of course not. He’s… I mean he’s trying to figure out what’s going on, and his girlfriend is currently being accused of things that are tantamount to Geneva Convention violations, so. I wouldn’t say he’s thrilled, but he’s not mad at you.”

“Right. He’s so not mad that you’re here, to mediate.”

“What are you talking about! I have no nefarious purposes, I wasn’t kidding when I said I was worried about you.”

Okay, maybe that was true, but Liam still felt anger curling up in his gut so he didn’t say anything. Not that he’d punch Stiles, he’d never do that, but. There was a lot of things he never thought he’d do that he’d ended up doing, so he couldn’t be too careful.

“Well,” Liam finally said. “Thanks, but. I didn’t really want to get into this and I still don’t.”

“Remind me where I asked for your opinion,” Stiles scoffed, but he didn’t ask any more questions. He just sat there with Liam until another car pulled into the lot.

It wasn’t Theo, though Liam thought it would be. Not a truck, but a sleek fast-looking car with tinted windows. Derek got out and came over to them. Liam couldn’t imagine him sitting in the grass, and he was right; Derek sat on the bench nearby. “Why are we here?” Derek asked.

“Very nice way to begin this,” Stiles said crossly. “And thus our empathetic foray begins.”

“Please,” Derek said. “If Liam wants to talk about it, he will. Otherwise, we should leave him alone. End of story. This isn’t our business.”

That helped. Liam pointed at Derek. “He’s right. Leave me alone.”

“He’s wrong,” Stiles said. “He’s never been so wrong.”

“You say that every time I’m slightly wrong,” Derek said.

“Name one other time I said that.”

“Last time you brought up favorite movies.”

Stiles was quiet for a second. “Wait, what’s your favorite movie? I forget the conversation.”

“You forget that you shouted me down to insist that the best movie in the entire world was-“

“Obviously,” Stiles cut him off, “I did not forget my side of the argument. The entire film industry has been going downhill since 1997.”

“What was in 1997?” Liam asked.

“George of the Jungle,” Stiles answered. “And yours was?”

Derek answered grudgingly. “The Fast and Furious movies.”

“Uh huh. Right. Because they’re about like, family and loyalty and stuff?” Stiles said. Sounded like he was trying to be understanding.

“Excuse me?” Derek frowned. Liam opened his eyes to look at him, from the tone of his voice, just in time to see Derek answer, with full sarcastic air quotes, “No, Stiles. They’re ‘about’ cars. Duh.”

“Y’know what, it’s all coming back to me now,” Stiles said with dawning fury. “I’m starting to get the feeling I only shouted you down because you have the _worst fucking opinion on planet earth!_ ”

So then that was a whole thing, but Liam didn’t pay much attention to it because he could hear Theo’s truck two streets over. He tuned in to Theo then, he heard him breathe and heard Theo’s hands move on the steering wheel and his heart beating normal and even. It was almost a surprise when Theo was there in real life.

“Hey,” Theo said distantly. Then he was looking down at Liam. “You dent the playground equipment?”

“Little bit.”

“How do you feel now?”

“Not super great.”

Theo sat down next to him, facing Stiles and Derek. “Is this comfortable?” Theo asked then. “The whole mulch thing?”

“I’m not really doing it because it’s comfortable,” Liam said, feeling kind of dumb. “I’m trying not to lose it, so.”

“So you’re uncomfortable on purpose?”

“Yeah, basically,” Liam said, but he sat back up.

Theo was waiting, hand out to take Liam’s. He wasn’t keeping his distance like Stiles was. Hell, he’d talked Liam down from this before, something that Liam felt sort of cold all over when he remembered because of the sheer implausibility of it. Theo had kept Liam from killing somebody. Nolan. “Hey,” Theo said again. Liam’s claws opened up cuts on the back of Theo’s hand before he got them under control again, but Theo didn’t even flinch. He laced their fingers together tighter, and held on. The middle of the merry-go-round that was Liam’s perception of time and space right now was that. Him.

“I’m okay,” Liam said.

Theo wasn’t one for pushing people to open up, so he just nodded. Then he looked past Liam. “And what are you two doing here?”

“Leaving,” Derek said, getting to his feet.

“No!” Stiles objected. “No, we are not leaving until we get to the bottom of this. You started this, you’re going to finish it.”

“I did not start this! You did,” Liam said, turning to glare. “You made me talk about why it’s weird with Kira, _with Kira_ , and it went like shit, and now you’re holding me hostage to talk about why. So like, I’m finished as far as I’m concerned.” His back hurt from twisting like that. He looked back at Theo.

“You have mulch in your hair,” Theo said.

“You could try being a little more curious, y’know,” Stiles said loudly. “Since you’re the thing this is all over.”

“Not a thing,” Theo said. His eyes didn’t leave Liam’s face. There was a question in them, one that Liam could choose whether or not to answer. He wasn’t going to force anything. That’s what Liam needed to know right now, to breathe.

“Actually, maybe you’d be the best choice to handle this,” Stiles said to Derek. “You know what it’s like to be unloved, something I’m obviously not familiar with. How did you get into Scott’s good graces?”

Derek did not sound amused when he answered. “I haven’t. He tolerates me at best. But that’s not the problem.”

“Oh? Please, enlighten us. What is the problem?”

“Getting Scott to think Kira did something wrong.”

Theo’s gaze sharpened. “You brought that up, huh,” he said to Liam.

“Stiles did,” Liam said. “But I didn’t… avoid it. Once he did. I said I was serious,” he added quickly.

“Never doubted you,” Theo said with half a smile. And sort of without thinking, Liam leaned forward to pres their foreheads together.

Obviously Stiles had to ruin the moment. “As your parent I find this disgusting,” he said.

“You are three years older than me,” Liam complained without moving. 

“But as your friend,” Stiles continued as if Liam hadn’t spoken, “I’m glad you have the support you need.”

Theo pulled back, but he kept his hand in Liam’s. Even though there was definitely blood dripping down his wrist now. “I don’t need to be in Scott’s good graces,” he said. “Don’t worry about that.”

“Okay, or Kira’s. Whatever.” Stile shrugged.

“Nope,” Theo said. “Not that either. I got what I deserve.” This was to Liam in particular. “You don’t have to get into this, I’m totally fine.”

“Well, hold on.” Stiles scrambled closer, wincing at the mulch on his hands. “Ow.” He sat closer to them; Liam figured he probably looked less like he was about to lose it. “What do you mean you’re fine? You’re fine being loathed and mistrusted?”

Theo drew back and looked at him. “Well, don’t sugarcoat it,” he said, and Liam caught Derek smiling. “Yeah,” Theo added, because he seemed to need to. “I’m fine with that. Especially when the alternative is Liam…”

“Hulking out?” Stiles suggested sympathetically.

“Sure.”

Stiles looked from Theo to Liam and then over to Derek and finally back to Theo. “No,” he said. “No. That’s not okay, though. We’re not going to let that happen. Right? Right?” he demanded a second time, staring at Derek.

“It sounds like that’s exactly what we’re going to do,” Derek said. “Since that’s what they want.”

“That is not what you want, though,” Stiles said to Theo. “I mean, not really. It’s a nice thing to say, very nice of you to reduce the stress on Liam, for sure, but you cannot really mean that.”

“Why not?” Theo asked readily.

“Because that would make you a good person with an operating conscience,” Stiles said with a straight face. “So.”

Liam didn’t realize he was starting to shift again until Theo winced, and then Liam retracted his claws immediately. “Sorry,” he said, and said to Stiles, “Maybe don’t be a dick about this.”

“Roger that.” Stiles was looking at the blood on Theo’s hand, vaguely queasy. “Seriously, though. Whatever you went through, I’m sure you didn’t deserve whatever you thought was happening.”

Theo blinked a couple times, looked down and then smiled. “You didn’t tell them the specifics?” he asked Liam.

“Not mine to tell,” Liam said.

Stiles was nodding, lips pursed. “Great. Very promising.”

Okay, funny. Funnier because Liam could feel Theo’s heart slow by a few beats, him calming down before he was about to do something that scared him, and Liam could already tell what that was going to be. And like, of course Theo would choose to open up basically out of spite. That was just so much of exactly who he was that Liam had a hard time not making out with him right here.

“If I tell you,” Theo said, “you’ll stop pressuring Liam about this?”

“Jesus. Yeah, I guess. If you want. Will you clean the gore off your hand first, though?”

“It’s not gore. It’s a little blood. Get over it.”Theo rolled his eyes and got to his feet. He helped Liam up too. Stiles was struggling to his feet on his own as they did.

“Gross. Pass.” Stiles looked at Derek then, once they were all standing. “Are you coming? Or are you still being a grump about this.”

“I’m going back home to sleep,” Derek said. “You don’t need me for this.” But he waited for a second, for Stiles to nod, before he went for his car.

“What’s going on there?” Theo asked, once Derek was in his car.

Stiles looked at Derek’s car, or at Derek probably. “Well,” he said. “That’s a long story.”

“Something for after I bare my soul, huh,” Theo said flatly. Liam would almost be worried Theo was annoyed, except that Stiles had a reluctant smile tugging at his mouth and Theo smiled back at him, for real. So, that was alright. And when Theo and Liam left the park, they had Stiles totally on their side. Like, more than a hundred percent.

“He called Kira a war criminal,” Theo said on the drive home. The first thing he said when it was just the two of them. “Do you think that’s a good sign?”

“I think so, yeah.” Liam glanced over at him. “Intense, though.”

“I think that’s just him.”

It was definitely just him, but hearing Theo say that was a good sign. Liam looked out the window, at the sun setting and the warm sky. “Thank you,” he said, making sure to not look at Theo when he said it. “For. I know you didn’t want to say all of that.”

“It’s okay,” Theo said. “Figured I’d have to at some point.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. You being who you are.”

Liam had to frown at him then, a semi-offended glare. “Hey.”

Somehow Theo already had a smile on his face. “Well! You’re a good person, and you said you were going to talk to her about it. So either you’d explain more or I would.”

“I wouldn’t tell anyone your stuff.”

“It’d be fine if you did, though. That’s why I told you. If you said it, I know it’d be because you had to. To people you trust.” Didn’t even sound like it was hard for Theo to say that, it sounded sincere. So Liam’s heart was sort of singing, even after he got home. He had a boyfriend who loved him and it was feeling more and more like they’d get to say it at some point, and things were going okay. “Are you gonna be alright tonight?” Theo asked.

And Liam meant it when he said, “Yeah, totally.” He really did think it’d all be good. But he was so annoyed to discover, in the end, that it didn’t matter. He still got home and flopped down onto his bed and found himself shivering. Not from cold, but from the transformation threatening to take over again. He was still out of control. It was stupid. Liam was so over it.

He had a lot to do anyways. He threw himself deeper into school, and running, and working out, and when Mason asked if he was okay Liam meant it when he said he was. He was fine. Mostly. Not un-fine enough to need anybody’s help with. There was still so much to do for Theo. Everybody had heard the vague sort of outline of what was going on after a week or so, and mostly nobody was saying anything but Lydia had stopped by Liam’s house one day to hug him. And Theo told him that Malia kept stopping by whenever she came to visit Peter, so it seemed like that couple was on their side, at least. Even if Malia did always end up breaking at least one thing in the apartment from clumsiness or the various bouts of wrestling she instigated. That was overall good though. And obviously Stiles had picked too. It’s just if Liam was being honest he didn’t want anyone to have to pick. He wanted everybody to just like each other, but Scott was busy with work apparently and Kira got an internship an hour away so. Liam had done everything he could, and that would have to be good enough.

It was coming up on Thanksgiving. Theo and Liam were were in the truck on the way to the woods and Theo said his name and then paused, awkwardly. “Okay,” Theo finally said. “Don’t take this the wrong way, but you’re not doing a good job pretending to be okay.”

“What do you mean?” Liam frowned. “I’m not pretending.”

“No, but you’re ignoring it. What, like it’s normal for someone to have to go exhaust themselves into being able to sleep?”

“Well, it’s not like, ideal-“ Liam began.

“Stop. Please,” Theo said, and looked over at him. “I get it,” he said. “Having things you don’t want to talk about. And I’ve tried waiting.”

Liam felt a spark in his gut, the kind of thing that made him very glad Theo hadn’t stopped driving. He needed to be running, like now. “Well, then I guess you just have to wait longer,” he said, trying to sound a little less like he was gritting his teeth.

“Not an option,” Theo said.

“Yes it is.”

Theo clenched his jaw. “Liam.”

It wasn’t hard to know what he meant by that. They knew what each other meant mostly always. But Liam didn’t want to know right now, so he ignored Theo too, like he ignored everything else these days. His hands were clenched into fists the rest of the way.

The sky was darkening when Theo parked; the days were getting shorter, colder. Liam was running in long sleeves and joggers now, and Theo was fully bundled up. Beanie, layers, the whole thing. He never tried to not come, though. Just kept showing up, no objections. Liam shouldn’t be mad at him, it should be impossible to be mad at him, but guess what.

“Liam,” Theo tried again once they were both out of the truck, standing. He’d come around to Liam’s side, but Liam walked away from him.

“I don’t want to talk,” Liam said.

“Believe me, I’m aware of that,” Theo said, bite in his voice. “But I can’t keep watching this.”

“Watching what?”

“Watching you fucking… losing your mind trying to be totally fine,” Theo said, throwing his arms out wide and then crossing them tightly again. “You’re not fine, Liam. In case you’ve somehow missed that.”

Liam felt like his eyes were going to boil out of his face, like his brain was catching on fire along with the rest of his insides. And shifting always felt a couple different ways - sometimes it felt like melting or like exploding and sometimes it was as easy as flexing - but today he felt it threatening to tear him apart. He almost didn’t think he’d be the same person, if he let it rip through him. It’d be someone new in his body, and the old him would be left in shreds somewhere. “I’m,” he started and couldn’t finish.

“You’re losing it,” Theo said.

No, he wasn’t. That was what Liam meant to say. He wasn’t losing it, he was fine. But instead he felt teeth coming in, forcing his jaw open a little wider.

“Please listen to me,” Theo said. Louder, because maybe he was closer, or maybe Liam’s ears were sharper. “I don’t need you to be okay, it’s-“

Actually, Liam didn’t want to listen. He didn’t need this. So he took off running. Theo definitely couldn’t catch up, there was no way, but after sprinting for like a minute, Liam found he couldn’t breathe. His claws were cutting into his palms, and his bones felt like they were vibrating. He wasn’t any closer to calm than before. Just close to passing out, with his heart beating out of his chest.

And then, after a moment when he was still trying to catch his breath, he heard footsteps on the trail. Theo, jogging towards him. He was breathing hard, but he didn’t slow down until he was right there, almost right next to Liam, and then he talked. Didn’t give Liam a second. “Hey, asshole. I don’t give a shit what’s making you upset, I just want you to tell me so I can help you.”

Liam barely managed to answer. “I don’t need help.”

“The fuck you don’t,” Theo snapped. “You think this is how somebody who’s okay acts?”

“Fuck you,” Liam said, and started running again.

Well, he meant to. But Theo had a grip on his sleeve, and when Liam tried to run he ended up flat on his back, winded. “Ow,” he coughed out, and struggled back to his feet.

“Do not run from this,” Theo told him.

“What, like you’ll stop me?” Liam taunted him.

Before he could run Theo yanked him around again, backed Liam up and slammed him into a tree while he was off-balance. Liam’s vision fuzzed out, white with anger, but when he focused again Theo’s eyes were fixed on him. So blue, Liam noticed on accident. Fucking pissed, too. “Yeah,” Theo said.

He was close, holding Liam there with a hand on his shoulder. Vulnerable, and Liam couldn’t keep himself from taking advantage of it. In one motion, without even thinking, Liam ducked Theo’s arm and spun them both around. So then Theo was the one pressed into the bark, and Liam had him by the neck, by the jaw. For a moment they were just there, both of their chests heaving as they breathed. Liam caught the liquid rush of Theo’s heartbeat, closer than he thought, registered how slow it was, and shame started to burn out the anger inside his ribcage. Deliberately, Theo moved one hand up, wrapped ice cold fingers around around Liam’s wrist and moved Liam’s hand off Theo’s neck to his chest. Not like he was escaping a crazy person, but he did it like he trusted Liam, even still.

“Hey,” Theo said. “I’m with you. That’s what this means to me. No matter what. Okay? I don’t care if you actually go to hell. I’m right fucking there with you. That’s all I want.” And he was never, like, easy to read except that he was right now. He was so sincere it was hard to look at.

“I know,” Liam said. “You don’t have to like. Open up because I’m… just because I’m having a bad day.” He was crying, shit - Liam tried to take his hand away, but Theo wouldn’t let him.

“No, I want to,” he said, holding Liam’s hand tighter. “Listen to me, alright? To what I’m actually saying. And not what you’re thinking.”

“Okay,” Liam said. He almost wanted to smile, somehow.

Theo smiled at him too, like he could hear Liam’s thoughts, and he squeezed Liam’s wrist a little tighter. Liam’s hand was right over his heart. “I trust you,” Theo said, and it hurt to hear it. “And I’ll tell you whatever you need me to. Not a stretch, okay?”

“But why? I’m just-“

“Because you do everything you can for me every other second, dude,” Theo said, no hesitation. “And I guess other people haven’t noticed that you’re using that, like, philanthropy to avoid talking about your own shit, but I have. You can’t have it both ways, Liam. You can’t do everything for me and not need anything back. Let me help you.”

Liam took a deep, shuddering breath and let it out through his nose, and as sudden as flipping a switch he felt like himself again. He was okay, he was alive, he was breathing. “Okay,” he said.

“Yeah?”

“Yes.” Liam used his free hand to wipe his face - the tears were still there. “I’m sorry,” he added.

As his answer, Theo pulled him in for a hug against his chest to hold him tight. The longer they stayed there, the more Liam felt like the all the hot anger was seeping out of him. He listened to Theo’s heart some more, the rushing of blood in his veins and air in his chest. It was sort of like white noise.

“So don’t take my head off, but,” Theo said eventually. “What’s going on?”

Liam huffed a breath out of his nose. He wanted to ask, to make sure Theo wouldn’t tell anybody, but that was a stupid question. Theo was a locked box. That’s why it meant so much for him to be doing this, now, Liam reminded himself. So he told him. “It’s just hard,” he started, and fuck it he was crying again. Theo held on to him, arms around Liam’s neck, and waited. “It’s hard,” Liam said again. “Seeing Nolan every day. And I don’t want to like…” It was harder to say this than Liam thought it’d be. He took a deep breath.

“Let’s keep walking,” Theo said after a second. “Come on.”

It was, actually, easier to talk when they were just walking next to each other. Not looking at each other. “Well,” Liam said, hands in his pockets. “I’m not trying to make him drop out or anything. I know I have to… like, see people I don’t like. But. I can’t see him without thinking of…”

“Him trying to kill you,” Theo finished for him.

“I don’t know that he was trying to kill me.”

“Oh, come on,” Theo said. “You don’t have to give him the benefit of the doubt, here. He only stopped when Scott made him, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Is it hard to say that?”

Liam shrugged one shoulder. “Dunno,” he said, and felt annoyance spiking again. “That’s not the point.”

“Then what’s the point?”

“I don’t know! I don’t know how to feel about any of this. He almost killed me, but I don’t know if he meant to. Then he almost… like, in the locker room, all of that, but. I don’t know. Monroe was manipulating him, probably, but. I don’t know how much that matters, either.”

Theo nodded slowly. “You know, you should probably talk to somebody about that.”

“Yeah,” Liam said miserably.

“You know that means you should talk to me, right?” Theo added after a second, with a really cute smile in his voice.

“Ha ha. So smart,” Liam sighed, but let himself walk a little closer to Theo. Maybe he wanted to be held again, actually. Or maybe he didn’t know what he wanted. “Yes,” Liam said then, also. “I get that. But. It just all seems stupid.” The sun was almost completely set, the sky several shades of blue fading into each other and shadows over most of the trail. Theo probably couldn’t see so well, but he didn’t seem scared at all.

Theo walked a little closer too. “That isn’t stupid,” he said. “I’m surprised you made it this far into the school year.”

“I’ve been trying,” Liam said, trying to make a joke of it. He got the feeling it fell flat. “I’m not feeling much like getting a therapist after everything, y’know. So. I feel like I should just get over it.”

“Fuck that,” Theo said firmly. His hand found Liam’s between them, linked a couple of their fingers loosely. “What would you say if I said that? That I should just get over something?”

Liam didn’t need to say it, to know what Theo meant. “Okay,” he said. “Right. I just…” He didn’t know what he meant to say there, the words slipped out of his brain while he was saying them. “I don’t know what to do,” he ended up saying, and it was so much of the truth that he felt a bit of a chill. And, when Theo didn’t say anything, Liam said, “Do you… I don’t know, do you think… do you have an idea?”

“I’m working on it,” Theo said. “Why didn’t you feel like you could say that, though?”

“Cuz it’s just how I feel, nobody can…”

“Nobody can help with that?” Theo suggested, in a tone of voice that meant he was about to roast Liam pretty hard for that. But then he didn’t. He just linked their hands more securely, and eventually he said, “You want to stay with me tonight? I’ll take you to school tomorrow.”

“Sure. But I’m fine, you don’t have to-“

“I know. I want to,” Theo said, and that sounded kind of suspicious so Liam looked over at him. Theo met his eyes and quirked an eyebrow.

“Oh,” Liam said. “Like…”

“Maybe.”

“Nefarious purposes are kind of your strong suit, huh,” Liam said, and just like that they were almost normal again.

There was something on Liam’s mind, though. Something that was baking in his mind. It took a while to get it out. He waited until the very last minute - when Theo was dropping him off at school, parked at the curb, and then Liam looked at him. Theo looked back, expectantly. “Hey,” Liam said. “I hope you don’t feel like... I mean I don’t mean…”

“Just say it,” Theo said.

“It probably seems like I don’t trust you,” Liam said. “And I do. I just…”

“Don’t worry,” Theo said after a second. “I know it’s your whole martyr thing.”

He sounded confident, but he actually looked way more confident a second later, when Liam leaned over and kissed him and said, “Exactly.”

“Text me, if.”

“I will,” Liam said as he got out, and he looked at him one last time as he shut the door. And then he almost said he loved him. Oh boy. That was probably going to be a thing coming up. But today, his thing was Nolan. Theo said he didn’t have his whole total idea yet, but the thing he thought Liam could do today was stop avoiding it.

He saw Nolan in psych of course, and today Liam just looked at him. He sat near the back, he could see Nolan three up the row and one to the left. And his breath still caught in his chest just like always, but it did help to look. To make a point of it, to pay close attention to Nolan and discover Nolan wasn’t paying any attention to him at all. He wasn’t exactly paying attention to the class, either, though. That was the one thing Liam learned that day. Nolan seemed to also not be doing exactly good, either. He was always tapping his pencil or foot or fidgeting, until the moment he zoned out and went stock-still. When Liam passed him on his way out of the room, he tuned in close to find Nolan was nervous as hell.

It wasn’t instantly better. Like, Liam still didn’t take any notes, but he was still mentally present at the end of the class. So. Success. Liam’s first successful day at school since everything. Things sort of looked up for him after that.

They got better for Theo, too, but not because of anything Stiles or Liam did. Theo did it on his own, in the end. He asked Liam over and then refused to let him help and made fried tofu and udon from scratch, off a recipe he printed somewhere and followed with the methodical precision of like, a chemistry experiment or something. Liam didn’t totally understand the point of Theo wanting him to watch that happen until Kira and Scott showed up.

Kira’s eyes narrowed as she caught the smell. “What’d you make?” Scott asked, very pleased. He liked the whole double date thing, he seemed super excited. He gave Liam a hug too, which Liam hadn’t realized he’d missed. Scott smelled like getting under a blanket next to Dad on an early winter morning, or sunshine. Or both.

“According to the internet,” Theo said to Kira, “I’m supposed to appease you with offerings.”

That sounded like nonsense. It made Kira smile, though. “You can try,” she said. But she stayed and they all ate. It was surprisingly really good. All four of them made pleasant conversation. Then Kira looked at Theo and said, “I could’ve let you out sooner.”

“I don’t know that I would’ve,” Theo said. “Given the option.”

Kira looked at Liam, who had been avoiding her eyes most of the time they were here. “I thought we were fine,” she said, mostly to Liam.

Almost like Theo could read his mind, he reached over and took Liam’s hand. “Look,” he said. “It’s not a crime to be protective.”

“You’re so dumb,” Liam said to him, and then looked at Kira and Scott. It occurred to him then that maybe he should be worried about them not being cool with this. Queer people. That was so obviously not the issue, though, that Liam didn’t think about it much more. Scott loved him, and Kira wasn’t evil. “I still think it’s messed up,” Liam said. “But.” He couldn’t say Theo deserved it and mean it. Maybe that was the cost of loving somebody. But he could let it go. “I don’t think there’s only one right way to feel. So.”

“Tell that to Stiles,” Scott said, which was pointed.

Theo had gotten better at this, he nodded and answered what Scott really meant. “So you don’t want me to talk about it?”

“I don’t care if you do or not,” Kira said. “I’d do it again.”

That made Theo smile, as much as it pissed Liam off. Before Theo could answer, though, Scott did. “I don’t know,” he said. “I think I’d try and find some alternatives, at this point. Now that you’ve like. Rediscovered your soul.”

“Thanks,” Theo said. Like it didn’t bother him that Scott said that and meant it. It bothered Liam a lot. But this was peace-making, and it was making Theo happy so Liam kept a better lid on how he felt than he had before and pretended this was all great. He took a page out of Theo’s book and kept his heartbeat under control. Scott and Kira left smiling, they hugged Liam and Theo goodbye and then the door closed and Liam listened for them to be out of the building and in the car and then down the street before he let himself relax.

Theo was doing the dishes. Liam was sort of drying. When he stopped listening to Scott and Kira, he found Theo paying attention to him. “Oh good,” Theo said. “You’re back.”

“I’ve been here the whole time,” Liam tried to say.

That just got him flicked in the face with water. “Seriously. What are you obsessing about?” Theo said, his voice sharp but not mean. “And since when are you good at lying?”

“Not that good, if you could tell.”

“I don’t count, I can always tell,” Theo said. “But they fell for it.”

“Good.”

Liam didn’t say anything to that, and Theo didn’t make him. They finished doing the dishes and set everything in the dish rack and then Liam went to Theo’s trash-picked couch and flopped down over it. He could hear Theo following more slowly. “It’s nothing,” Liam said.

“I’ll wait,” Theo answered.

They didn’t need to get into it, even though Liam ended up staying the night. Wasn’t a school night, so he didn’t have anywhere else to be. He borrowed some of Theo’s clothes to sleep in, a T-shirt that was a little bigger than Liam’s own shirts and sweats that were definitely too long.

“How’s Mason?” Theo asked, while Liam was brushing his teeth and not thinking about how he could maybe one day live somewhere with Theo at all times.

“He’s good,” Liam said after he spit. “I dunno. Him and Corey are more… doing couples things, I dunno.”

“Like what?” Theo took over at the sink when Liam was done, to brush his teeth too.

Liam hesitated, leaning against the towel rod, shrugged. “I mean, dates and stuff. Hanging out more, going places. I think they went to an orchard together last weekend, Corey posted cute pictures.”

Theo nodded. There was a significant pause before he could reply, but when he could he asked, “You want to do stuff like that?”

“Not really,” Liam shrugged. “I don’t care. I’m not dating you at people, or whatever. And I never post on Instagram anyways. Unless you want to, like-“

“No,” Theo said. “Just asking.”

That sounded like the end of it, but then Liam thought of something and tried not to talk about it and in the end, had to. He brought it up when they were getting into bed. “I’m not embarrassed of you or anything,” Liam said, adjusting his pillows. “And I don’t care about coming out.”

“Coming out,” Theo repeated. He finished something on his phone and then set it on his nightstand.

“Yeah, as bi.” Liam listened for a reaction and didn’t really get one; Theo just nodded. “Since… that’s what I am.”

“Okay.”

“Are _you_ worried about that? Coming out?”

Theo shook his head, and lay down. “You need the light?” he asked.

“No.”

So Theo turned it off, and scooted around to get more comfortable. Inconveniently, once they were there with the lights off and supposedly ready to sleep, Liam found out he wanted to tell Theo after all. “You still awake?” he said softly.

“Yeah, babe,” Theo sighed.

It seemed like a bad time to point out he’d never called Liam babe before, but Liam did notice and had to take a second to relish it. “It just,” he said at last, “bothered me that Scott said you didn’t have a soul. Even if he was joking.”

“Oh.” Theo stayed where he was, on his back with his hands folded over his chest. Like a vampire or something. He was quiet for a while, and then it seemed like he only said something because Liam didn’t. Not because he wanted to. “Why did that bother you?”

“Because-“

“I wasn’t a good person,” Theo said. His eyes were closed. “Please don’t tell me you’ve forgotten that.”

“I haven’t,” Liam said, though he probably forgot more than Theo wanted him to. He got the feeling that Theo was the type of person that never forgot anything, and never wanted anyone else to either. “But. Still. That’s kind of rude.”

Theo huffed out a bit of a laugh. “I think he gets to be rude, though.”

“No. Nobody does. You’re my boyfriend.”

“Okay.” Theo sort of scoffed. “Sure.”

“The you that did all that awful stuff is the same person who saved my life,” Liam said, turning to look at Theo. “I can’t just like. Throw you under the bus.”

That got Theo to laugh again. “Liam. It’s not throwing me under the bus to say that I killed people.”

“I think it is!” Liam insisted, and Theo put a hand over his eyes. “They can’t just bring that up whenever they want to prove you’re wrong. Not that you’re… I’m not saying you never did it, but. I don’t think you have to be paying for it forever. Does that make sense?”

“Not really,” Theo said, but he stretched his arm out to pull Liam closer to him and Liam threw an arm over Theo’s chest to get comfortable. “But I’m not going to argue with it. I just…” He fell silent then, for long enough that Liam got a little worried. “I hope you’re not telling yourself I was… misunderstood, or just making mistakes or something.”

Liam frowned, and tightened his arm on Theo. “What do you mean?” he asked. “You don’t think you were?”

“I think…”

“Some zombie doctors operated on you before you hit puberty,” Liam said when Theo didn’t seem to know how to answer. “Safe to say your sense of right and wrong was like, messed up, right? They worked for the freaking Nazis.” Liam’s head moved as Theo snorted, and Liam smiled. “So it’s not like you were choosing to do the worst thing you could on purpose.”

“No,” Theo agrees quietly.

“You thought you were doing what you had to, right?”

There was another long pause. “I… yeah. I thought… well, people weren’t exactly lining up to take my side, so. Loyalty was kind of a new concept for me, that’s for sure,” Theo said, but then he seemed to regret having said anything. “We don’t need to… I’ve never said there’s a good explanation for what I’ve done.”

“Sure,” Liam said. “But that doesn’t mean there wasn’t _any_ explanation.”

Theo let out a deep breath then, and he turned closer to kiss Liam’s head. “I love you,” he said. “But you can’t say this to anybody else.”

“You do?” Liam said.

“Do not try and make me say it again,” Theo said crossly. “It was hard enough the first time, alright.”

Liam pushed himself up then, put his hands on Theo’s shoulder and held himself up to look down at him and said, “I love you so much, dude.”

A reluctant smile pulled the corner of Theo’s mouth up. “Whatever,” he said, but he didn’t try and get away. And Liam thought, like he sort of always had, that Theo didn’t mind kind of being manhandled if it meant he got to be held. Maybe it was like that, maybe Theo didn’t mind being yelled at if he got to be part of the pack. And like, he obviously thought that was still up for debate somehow. God.

“I love you,” Liam said again, “and not because I think you’re perfect.”

“Gross. I’m trying to sleep.”

Liam leaned down to kiss him, which was really not the best idea on a school night because then they didn’t end up actually getting around to sleeping for a while, but. It was kind of a special night anyways. So then they were like, even more of an actual couple but on top of that, Liam was thinking about everything when he went into school Monday.

“You look happy,” Mason said when he saw Liam before first period. “With Theo this weekend?” He smiled and wiggled his eyebrows at him.

Liam grinned back and shrugged. “How about you?” he asked. “You and Corey.”

“We’re great,” Mason said with a shrug. “I’m going with his family to Denver during Christmas break, so that’s cool.” He looked over at Liam then, and considered before the next thing he said. “You want to do something with them sometime? Like an actually dinner or something?”

Liam grinned. “That sounds awesome, let’s do it.”

So like, yeah. Maybe he was kind of riding a high when he got to second period. He was feeling better than ever. But also, Nolan dropped his book right as Liam was walking by. That gave Liam the opening to do what he did - without having a panic attack, Liam bent down and picked it up Nolan’s book for him. “Here,” he said, and handed it back.

“Thanks,” Nolan said, with a hint of a stutter. His heart picked up so quick, Liam couldn’t help but notice it.

“Yep.”

That was the start of a thought Liam had, then. Nolan might be triggering him, but that didn’t make him the real problem. He hadn’t done anything since, and he was scared of Liam. For pretty good reason, too. Liam couldn’t totally remember his hulk out in the locker room, but he knew what he did.

“Yes,” Derek said when Liam told him some of this. They were running together, around the perimeter of the park. Derek’s nose was pink. “Ball’s in your court. He shot you, you threw him into lockers. That makes you even. If he did anything, it’d seem like he was trying something again.”

“That does seem true,” Liam said.

“Of course it’s true.”

“He also doesn’t heal,” Liam said after a few minutes more of jogging, when he thought of it. “So his arm’s still in a sling.”

“Oh.” Derek didn’t seem to know what to say about that. He was quiet for the rest of the run. That was pretty usual, though, Derek didn’t do a ton of talking. When they first started doing this Stiles had told Liam that Derek was worried about being weird given how much older he was than them so he didn’t give that much advice. So.

The runs were shorter, and more like three times a week instead of every day. On the weekend, Derek and Stiles would join them. Stiles would jog with Theo while Derek and Liam went three times as fast, and then they’d all meet back by the cars. This way it was a friend thing, not just a rage control thing. And, on top of all of that, Theo wouldn’t admit it but he loved talking to Stiles. They pretended to be such enemies but when Derek and Liam got back from that very first day, Stiles and Theo were sitting on a picnic table together, pointedly not laughing in the way that meant they were having a really good time.

They were at the table today too, though they were standing and both of their heart rates were fast. “What in the world,” Derek said, and they both sped up for the last dozen yards.

Theo and Stiles each had one leg up on the table and were attempting to stretch as far over that leg as possible, like ballerina style. “I’m further,” Theo said.

“Don’t be delusional, I’m way further,” Stiles said.

Neither of them were within a foot of their shoe. Both of them were definitely doing the best they could.

“Hey,” Liam said, and went for a quick kiss. Theo briefly straightened to meet him, and then tried again. “Why are you doing this?”

“He said I wasn’t flexible,” Theo said.

Derek looked at Stiles. “He said the same thing,” Stiles said.

After they settled who was more flexible - Stiles by a hair, but possibly because he had longer arms - they all sat back down. Liam let Theo sit close and put his hands in Liam’s pockets so they could hold hands. And also, so Theo had a reason to wrap around him. He got nervous about it sometimes. Liam felt Theo press his lips against Liam’s shoulder.

Across the table from them, Stiles cleared his throat. “Gross,” he said. “How was your triathlon?” He looked at Derek, who was stiff and a foot away from him.

“Fine,” Derek said. “You know who Nolan is?”

“Yeah, that little twerp that betrayed us,” Stiles said, and looked at Liam. Theo squeezed Liam’s hands in his. “What about him?”

Derek looked at Liam, clearly considering his job done. It was kind of funny, the robot way he attempted to be a good person. Liam had to smile. “Okay, well that’s _a_ segue, I guess. I was just asking if like. Maybe he’s waiting on me to make a move. Because I sort of almost killed him after he tried to kill me.”

“Make a move,” Stiles repeated, with something close to horror. “What kind of move? And keep in mind your boyfriend is currently entwined with you.”

Liam rolled his eyes. “Like, so we’re cool.”

“He tried to kill you and you want to be cool with him?” It was pretty obvious that Stiles thought that was stupid.

Liam could feel Theo smiling against his shoulder. “Well!” Liam said defensively to all three of them. “Yeah. I mean it’s not like our class is that big, I have to see him for two more years.”

“Oh boy,” Stiles said. “I’ve been there. And what you do is avoid eye contact at all costs, and stick with your friends.”

“I don’t want to do that,” Liam said.

Theo snorted. “And don’t try and make Liam do something he doesn’t want to do,” he said. “Doesn’t end well.” He shifted a little, squeezed Liam closer. Okay so like either he and Stiles were super cool with each other or Theo was getting cooler about PDA. Or maybe both. Either way, Liam loved it. “You want to… make friends with the guy,” Theo said.

“Yeah, I think so.”

“Dumb,” Stiles said.

“You should give him a gift,” Derek suggested.

“A thank you for not killing me and all my friends gift,” Stiles nodded, pretending to think it was a good idea.

“Well, maybe. Kind of like that,” Liam said. He was getting a little defensive, actually, and he looked over at Theo for support. Theo just smiled, and squeezed him tighter. This was unbelievable. Liam was so warm and happy that he thought he might actually melt or something. He felt incredible - so incredible that he forgot what he was saying. So he sort of just let Derek and Stiles change the conversation to the pack secret santa this year, and who they hoped to get.

Stiles wanted Kira, unequivocally. Derek thought secret santa was stupid - he thought they should let him subsidize the whole thing and save everybody money. “It’s not about the money,” Stiles said fiercely. “It’s about the gesture. The love. We are all bought in.”

“I’m just going to buy something now,” Theo said. “And give it to whoever I get.”

“Why? You’re that allergic to emotional gestures?” Stiles frowned. “That makes me concerned about your relationship. Liam deserves to feel treasured, alright. You’d better do right by him.” 

Liam was already rolling his eyes, but Theo surprised him by answering for him. “First of all, I do. Fuck you.” Stiles flipped him off, in a friendly way. “Second of all, I don’t think my credit card will still be working by then. So.”

There was a beat of silence. “Wait, what?” Derek said, leaning in.

“What?” Theo echoed in a lower voice.

“What do you mean by that,” Derek said, in an annoyed and clipped voice.

“I mean it’ll be in collection by then.”

Stiles was just staring at Theo. “Theo,” he said. “You’re a person I formerly thought of as a smart guy. Why the fuck are you wracking up credit card debt before you hit your twenties?”

Theo pulled away from Liam to sit up straight, which Liam was annoyed about on a couple of levels but primarily because it felt like Theo was getting ready for a fight. Also, though, because he looked cold basically immediately. “Because I don’t have money,” Theo said, like that was obvious. “Is that so unfathomable, that you-“

“Okay, hold on, it’s not like I’m loaded,” Stiles frowned. “I’m the lowest possible tier of a government employee, and my dad’s an elected official in a small town, alright. I understand not having money, but-”

“It is a little unfathomable,” Derek said with a straight face.

“How?” Theo demanded. “My whole family’s dead.”

“So they left you money,” Derek said reasonably.

“Good one.”

“How’d you get your truck, then?” Stiles cut in. “That’s pretty new, right?”

“It’s a 2015,” Derek and Theo said in unison, and then regarded each other with great suspicion. Eventually, Theo continued, “Not having an address does sort of work in my favor in a few ways.”

Liam didn’t know what that meant - he was kind of missing a lot of the point of this - but Derek raised his eyebrows so that meant it was a big deal. “You’re evading debt collectors at the age of eighteen?” Derek said. “Just so we’re clear.”

“Don’t you have to get home?” Theo asked Liam, which was a lie.

“Yes,” Liam said, because Theo wanted him to. “I… Mom wants us to have dinner together. So.” He got up when Theo did, trying to look and sound less suspicious than he felt. “Uh. We’ll talk… soon.”

Stiles and Derek just watched them. “You can’t run from this,” Stiles said. “Sooner or later you’ll need to like, pay taxes.”

“Not if I can help it,” Theo said, already walking for the car.

Liam waved, sort of awkwardly, and got in too. He could hear the boys behind them, when they were driving away. “Well, I know two things,” Stiles said. “That he’s not the guy he was two years ago, and that you’re scheming.”

“I’m not scheming,” Derek said.

“You’ve got your scheming face on.”

“I have my cold face on, if that’s what you mean,” Liam heard Derek say, and then he faded out as the truck sped away.

From the driver’s seat, Theo looked over at him. “Are they talking about me?” he asked. Didn’t sound sure he wanted to hear.

“No, they’re arguing,” Liam said. He blinked a couple times, and shook his head. “Uh. Do you need money?”

“I’m fine,” Theo said.

And Liam didn’t need to see Stiles make his favorite skeptical face to know that was a lie. It just was one.

Theo didn’t really lie to him, so Liam took a while to think about this. It probably wasn’t the end of the world. Theo used to lie all the time, after all. He liked doing it, and he was pretty good at it - honestly, it was probably something close to a hobby for him. And it wasn’t even a big lie. It was the kind of thing Liam could see through immediately, so it wasn’t like Theo was trying to convince him particularly hard. Because he probably could convince Liam, if he really wanted to. So wasn’t this basically the same thing as Theo asking to be left alone?

“No,” Mason said. “Because he definitely could just say, I don’t want to talk about it.”

Corey made a face, and crunched down on his celery stick. “Okay,” he said. “But people don’t react perfectly in the moment. He was stressed, whatever. You can ask him about it later.”

“I don’t even know if I want to,” Liam said, with a deep sigh. “Like. I don’t have a ton of money to fix it. Or any, like. Advice. And he already knows I have his back and I’ll do anything I can.”

“You could say that again if you want,” Mason suggested.

“Yeah. I think so.”

“Derek’s probably just going to pay it,” Corey said, but not like he thought Theo was freeloading. He sounded almost nice about it. “So I don’t see why this has to be a big deal.”

Liam didn’t say it, but. It was just that he was worried Theo had been not telling him something that was apparently actually wrong. So maybe there were conditions on their relationship Liam hadn’t thought of, maybe Theo said he trusted him but he meant that he trusted him sort of, in some ways. Maybe not with big things.

“Theo’s taking you home?” Mason said as they went to throw out their trash. He was taking Corey’s trash for him.

“Yeah,” Liam said.

“Well, you want to hang out this weekend, maybe? Do some gaming.”

Liam nodded with a smile. “That’d be cool.”

“Okay.” Mason was smiling back. “It’s gonna be okay.”

“I know,” Liam said, and mostly meant it.

Next period was just study hall, and Liam put his books down and then got the bathroom pass. He wanted a second of quiet. The closest bathrooms were in the locker rooms, so he figured after five minutes they’d be empty and he’d be good to just sit on one of the benches and think. So he was walking slowly, just sort of taking his time, when he heard something that made him flip over into his werewolf senses.

At first he just heard yelling, and then as he listened closer he realized it was worse. He heard some words he wasn’t totally comfortable repeating, actually, like. Hate crime type stuff, that Liam hadn’t heard for a while after moving to Beacon Hills. So that wasn’t good. And then on top of that, he heard a heartbeat he knew. Nolan’s, actually. Holy shit. Liam picked up speed before he really knew what he was doing, went through the doors at top speed. He didn’t know what he thought he’d find. Nolan bullying somebody, probably. But instead it was the opposite. Three upperclassmen had Nolan backed into a corner. His arm was still in a sling. And Liam felt his heart do something weird in his chest.

“Hey,” Liam said loudly. It was very barely not a growl. Nolan flinched anyways, which - shit. Liam’d been too busy feeling like shit for how Nolan almost killed him and totally forgot what he had to be sorry for too. Okay.

The first thing he did was get between Nolan and everybody else, put his arm out to keep Nolan firmly behind him. He could smell blood, which made his instincts go crazy, but he kept his eyes normal. No gold allowed. He was going to keep these douchebags away without shifting. And like. That was a good goal at first, but then they said some more stuff that was homophobic and stupid. Liam definitely wouldn’t have kept his cool, if it wasn’t for the months of running and talking about how he felt and knowing that Mason and Theo and Corey and Stiles and everybody had his back. So he definitely didn’t react as badly as he would’ve before. It’s just that a good reaction was still sort of punching one of them in the face, and then the other two teamed up on him and he had to let out a little extra power to get them off.

“Fucking mutant freak,” the one he punched coughed out.

And he was. That was most of what was making him want to cave their skulls in. But he was also a person, and he was part of a pack so he didn’t. “Leave him alone,” Liam said. “Stop fucking picking on people.”

“Or what?” one of the three of them said.

“Or I’ll stop you,” Liam said. He unclenched his fists on purpose then, and took a step back so he was totally in front of Nolan again. Nolan hadn’t moved, he was just pressed against the lockers with his still not healed arm and his heart hammering fast in his chest. “And also you’ll get suspended. And maybe arrested, since I’m really great friends with the sheriff’s son. You want to get arrested?”

That did it. They left for class, after a couple more parting remarks that Liam ignored. He turned to Nolan then, and realized he didn’t exactly know what to say. “Uh,” he said.

“Thanks,” Nolan said. His eyes were wide.

“Totally. And I mean it. If they bother you, yell. I’ll hear you.”

Nolan didn’t say okay. He just kept looking at Liam, his heart still way too fast. He was still scared.

“Hey,” Liam said. “We don’t have any, like. Beef, or anything.”

“I shot you,” Nolan said. He sounded slightly hysterical. “I think that’s kind of worse than beef.”

Liam snorted. “Well. I hulked out. So I think we’re at least even.” And that got Nolan to breathe a little easier, so that was mission accomplished, at least. “And I’m bi, so. Whether or not you’re-“

“Me too,” Nolan said quickly.

“Awesome.”

“Is it?”

Liam raised his eyebrows. “Uh. Yeah. Totally, dude. Whoever you want to be, is like. Totally cool.”

“Tell that to my mom.”

“I will,” Liam said. “If you need that. How’s your arm?”

Nolan looked down at his own arm, like the answer might surprise him. “Uh,” he said. “Well. Out of the cast, but still sore.” He glanced back up at Liam. “How fast do your bones heal?”

“Couple hours,” Liam said. “But all the pain’s compressed into those - oh! Hold on.” He reached out, and Nolan flinched again but whatever. Liam was going to help him. He wrapped his hand around Nolan’s bicep and leached whatever pain he could, in the moment. It ached more than a little, it seemed like those dudes had like hit Nolan’s arm or something.

“Whoa,” Nolan said, and took a deep breath.

“Yeah, one of the perks,” Liam said and took his hand away. He shook his hand out a little. “I probably have to get back to class. Are you good?”

“Yeah.”

That didn’t seem totally right, so Liam tried to guess. “I come by this way to get to biology,” he said. “I can wait for you.”

Nolan was very good at not replying to questions. He hesitated for so long Liam was kind of annoyed. “Why are you doing this?” he asked at last. “I mean. What we did to you was… I am so, so sorry about it, too, but. I get it if you just never want to talk again, and like.”

“I don’t want that, though,” Liam said, and for the first time in a long time he could feel what he knew to be right in his gut. No doubts. Just knowing, for the first time in like, months at least. “I think we could be friends, maybe,” he said. “It’d make us play better next year.”

That made Nolan smile a little, but he still seemed nervous. That could just be him, though. He was never exactly outgoing, as far as Liam could remember. “I’d like that,” he said.

“I’ll come find you after,” Liam promised. He went back to class then, or started to but then he remembered he had to pee so he went to a different bathroom and finally made it back to study hall with only like a half hour left. And when study hall was over, Liam found Nolan in the locker room and walked him to biology. No panic attacks. Nothing. Almost like the idea of Nolan was way scarier than the actuality of him.

He was super excited to tell Theo about the whole thing, and hurried out to him at the end of the day. “You will never guess what happened,” Liam said the moment he was close enough.

“Hello,” Theo said with a smile in his eyes, and kissed him. He looked good today, like cosy in a rugged kind of way. Sheepskin-lined jean jacket, a beanie, big boots. “What happened? You seem good.”

“I am good. I’m great. I had a great day.” Liam couldn’t keep from grinning, especially when Theo wrapped his arms around him and squeezed him close. As bundled up as he was, Theo was still a little chilled - or maybe Liam was just burning up from excitement. “How are you?” Liam asked, attempting to be fair.

“Fine. I want to hear your thing, tell me.”

“Okay. So me and Nolan are cool,” Liam said in a whisper.

“You sure?” Theo asked. “Here he comes.”

Liam was very sure. He waved at Nolan when he saw him and got an awkward smile back, and then looked back at Theo. “Dude. It was crazy.”

“I bet. You want to tell me in the car? So we can be not here?”

“Yeah, sure.” Liam went around the truck to the passenger side and pulled the door open. It hit him particularly hard, the way the truck smelled like Theo. Well, not like _him_ but something about him. Whatever in Liam’s mind is marked as Theo. It was too complicated to call out specifically - he wasn’t, like. A perfume guy or whoever would know how to describe it. But whatever.

“So what happened?” Theo asked as they pulled out of the parking lot.

“I sort of saved him from bullying and also he told me he’s bi.”

“You didn’t know?” Theo frowned at him when he had a second, extremely skeptical.

“No. Did you?”

“Uh yeah. You haven’t noticed how he looks at you?”

“What do you mean, how he looks at me?” Liam demanded indignantly. “What the hell.”

Theo wouldn’t elaborate after that, he got very quiet about it which was kind of annoying. And that made it hard for Liam to casually turn the conversation to Theo’s sexuality, something they had conspicuously not talked about even still. Even now that they were officially a couple that’s definitely not straight in some kind of way. Possibly a bisexual way - or like, at least in a half bisexual way. Liam wanted to know! Not like he was being pushy, it had been like. Months. But whatever. He didn’t _have_ to know or anything.

Not a big deal.

But the Theo refused to tell literally anybody who he got for secret santa. Like, actually point-blank wouldn’t say when Liam asked him. “Pretty sure it’s in the name,” he said, trying to be funny about it but Liam was actually kind of annoyed. 

“Come on, I told you who I got,” he said.

“You told me because you have no idea what to give Lydia and need help figuring it out,” Theo said, and like. Yeah. He was right. That’s why they were at this Sephora sniffing a billion perfumes to find the one Lydia was always wearing. But still. Again, did not have to be a big deal. It was just two things that had happened in pretty close succession where Theo didn’t want to tell him things. That was feeling like a bad thing.

At the same time, Liam was hanging out at Theo’s more than ever. Like, definitively more than just hanging out, actually. Staying there at least a night on the weekends and sometimes on school nights too, and over there even more when he didn’t stay the night. Most afternoons. It didn’t really hit him how often he was over until Theo kissed him on the forehead and said, “I’m going to take care of my secret santa. I’ll be like, an hour. You can stay here if you want.”

“An hour,” Liam said. “Is most of that going into drive time?”

Theo just smiled at him. “Will you stay?”

“Yeah,” Liam said. “I want to watch that thing with you once you’re back.” Which was true, he did, but then he was sitting alone in Theo’s apartment and he was looking around thinking about how this was still mostly Theo’s space. His area. And Liam had his room at mom’s, sure, but he’d sort of like to have his own place sometime soon. Maybe even somewhere with Theo. But he had to stop himself there, from going and planning the rest of their lives together. If Theo wouldn’t tell him basic facts, living together type plans were probably premature.

He was sitting there, having his own personal crisis, when there was a knock on the door. Loud, it echoed off the walls. Before Liam could decide if he would answer it, he smelled who it was.

“Open up,” Malia called. And when he didn’t answer fast enough, she yanked it open herself. “Where’s Theo?” she asked.

“Out. Doing santa stuff.”

Malia nodded with the look on her face that Liam knew was trying to be polite but was actually losing her patience. “Who’d you get for secret santa?” she asked then.

“None of your business. I don’t know, why?”

“You don’t know? You have to know,” Malia said with a frown.

“No,” Liam said, very annoyed. “Obviously I know. But like. Why would I tell you?”

Malia came a little closer, like prowling almost. “I think you have my girlfriend,” she said. “And I want to make sure she has a good Christmas.”

“So take care of her on your own, don’t make me do it.”

“So you do have her.”

“I didn’t say that!” Liam said defensively. It probably wasn’t much use, though. Malia had great instincts, better than the rest of them, and Liam wasn’t really good at lying without preparation. So it was probably a matter of time until she got it out of him anyways. “Who does Theo have?” he asked. “Do you know?”

She shook her head. “I just know you smell guilty every time you see her, ever since we drew names. Theo isn’t sloppy like that.”

“Oh,” Liam said. “Good.” He felt vaguely queasy, sick to his stomach because if Theo was so good at lying maybe he was taking it for granted, how much he could trust him.

“Whoa,” Malia said, and came over to sit next to him. “What’s going on?” she asked in her deep, brisk voice.

Liam didn’t want to tell her; his heart was so like. Delicate and really fucking bruised, honestly. “Nothing.”

She snorted. “That’s bullshit.”

“I don’t want to talk about it!” Liam said.

“I feel like you might want to.”

The truly awful part was that he sort of did. “It’s like. Emotional,” he said resisting the urge to add that Malia wasn’t good at that. It seemed mean. And obvious.

“Try me,” Malia said.

And then Liam wished he had said what he thought was obvious though possibly also mean because now he didn’t have a good reason to say no. Besides just not wanting to. Though, again, that seemed mean. What was the harm, anyways, in telling her? It couldn’t hurt. “I just. I don’t know. I don’t want to doubt him, but I also know he’s a good liar. I guess that’s the thing. Right now.”

“Makes sense,” Malia agreed, matter-of-fact. She nodded a couple times, looking directly ahead. “He’s a very good liar.”

Liam glared at her. “Hey.”

“He is! I’m stating a fact, it’s not a judgement.”

“Are you sure?”

That earned a reluctant smile from Malia. “It’s both,” she admitted, caught out. “But I do like him more than I did before.”

“That’s not saying much,” Liam mumbled crossly.

Malia took him by the shoulders then, she placed both of her surprisingly strong and big hands on his shoulders and looked him in the eye and said, “You are dating him so I understand. I wouldn’t let anyone say anything about Lydia. But. Let me say this.” And she smiled a little. “Theo is a compulsive liar and a Benedict Arnold but there is no doubt in my mind that he loves you as much as his little lizard heart is capable of. Do not doubt that.”

“When did you learn who Benedict Arnold is?” Liam asked.

“School!” Malia said defensively. “In school. Where everyone else does.”

“Just wondering.” He couldn’t keep pretending like he wasn’t going to answer, though, not with the disappointed look she was giving him that was also kind of frighting since her hair was down and she looked wild. “Okay. You’re right.”

“I know,” Malia said. “I’ve been in a relationship for seventeen months. That means I know what I’m doing. Longer than any of you losers.” She smiled, then, at him and pushed herself up. “Plus, Peter gives me advice and I basically have to do only the opposite of that, so. Cheat sheet. And I know he’s listening from his place because he always follows me out to the car with his senses and I’m _glad_ he can hear me say that,” she added with a glare at the ceiling. “But I’ve gotta go. Date night.”

“Have fun,” Liam said half-heartedly.

“We will.”

“Gross.”

Malia grinned, and left.

Liam meant to take her advice - he agreed with it, after all, but somehow he couldn’t help himself. He had doubts. Then they were going to the Christmas party and he still hadn’t said anything. And like Theo could tell, obviously, that something was wrong but he wasn’t saying anything either - of course, because he never said anything first, but. He was being normal. Like, he was holding Liam’s hand on the way downstairs. They were being picked up, to try and minimize the amount of cars at Scott’s house since more than a dozen people would be there. Derek and Stiles volunteered to get them on their way into town, so Theo and Liam were waiting outside Theo’s building. Which was actually the Hale family building.

“Last chance to tell me who you got,” Liam said. “I’m guessing Derek? From the wrapping?”

It was an apparently heavy box, wrapped in plaid paper with a black ribbon. Very sophisticated. Definitely for a guy. Unless Theo was trying to throw people off. Or maybe he wouldn’t wrap a present differently for a girl, which was probably woke of him.

Again, though, Theo just smiled at him like he was being cute or something. “You’ll see,” he said, and squeezed Liam’s hand.

Like what the hell was that even supposed to mean! Liam squeezed back though, and then said, “Oh. Is that them? That’s a Jeep, right?”

It was them. Stiles pulled up to the curb and looked through the passenger side window at them. Immediately he pointed at Theo. “Shut the fuck up.”

“He didn’t say anything!” Liam said.

“Don’t backsass me, young man. I’ll turn this Jeep around. Don’t test me,” Stiles said firmly. “Come on, get in.”

“We flipped a coin,” Derek said from the back seat. He looked very unhappy about this situation. Theo joined him back there, so Liam sat up front, and it took a little extra thinking about the situation for Liam to connect the dots. He got it like six minutes too late, that Theo and Derek were disappointed about having to take the Jeep. Kinda dumb. Whatever.

“Seatbelts on?” Stiles asked, and pulled away before either of them answered. “So who’d you guys get?”

Liam glanced back at Theo. “We’re not telling people,” he said, which was a fun joke way of framing the situation that everyone seemed to enjoy.

“Good. That was a trick question,” Stiles said. “You passed. Secret santa is meant to stay secret.”

“This again,” Derek said.

“You disagree?” Theo asked him.

So then they started talking about how Derek didn’t necessarily disagree, he just thought that secret santa was a dumb idea. His idea was called secret benefactor, and neither Theo nor Stiles seemed to like it. But Stiles was only half participating in the conversation, he kept glancing over at Liam and once they were parked outside Scott’s house Stiles said, “Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” Liam said. “Why.” He got out before Stiles could say anything else, and tried to make it inside.

Stiles caught up to him, though. “Liam,” he said. “Seriously, what’s going on. Everything okay?”

“Yes,” Liam said sullenly.

“Tell that to your face.” Stiles opened the door without knocking - things you could do when it was your best friend’s house, Liam guessed. “What’s going on? Is it lizard boy?”

“He’s only like. A quarter lizard,” Liam muttered.

“That feels like a yes.”

It was not a no, but Liam just bent over to take his shoes off. Derek and Theo came in and squeezed past them, and Stiles shut the door behind them. “It’s not,” Liam lied. “Whatever.”

“It’s not whatever! Liam. Don’t you trust me?” Stiles demanded, sounding very hurt. He put his hand on Liam’s shoulder and pulled him closer.

“Stiles,” Liam said.

“What! What have I done? Please, just tell me.”

 _“They are directly in front of us,”_ Liam whispered urgently.

“Why do you think I’m whispering?” Stiles said, at full volume.

In front of them, Liam saw Derek smile and try to hide it by turning away. “I need a beer,” he said. “Theo?”

“Yup,” Theo said, and they both made it a few feet further away, into the kitchen.

That wasn’t exactly enough distance, but Liam humored Stiles - because otherwise Stiles would never leave him alone - and whispered, “Everything is fine I just have to talk to Theo. I want to make sure he has a good time, too. He’s… nervous.”

“Maybe he’s nervous because the vibes you’re putting out are wild,” Stiles suggested. “Talk to him first.”

“Okay. That is… actually good advice,” Liam said. “I will.” He looked around at everyone else, too. Scott was standing at the kitchen island, talking with his mom and Malia. Lydia was on the couch, talking with Kira. That was all who was here at the moment. “Okay,” he said. “Yeah.”

Stiles nodded several times. “The tone of surprise, huh. You don’t think I could have any good ideas?”

“I think… this is another trick question,” Liam said, which successfully made Stiles smile. So. Mission accomplished. “I’ll talk to him,” he promised.

“Good.” Stiles clapped his hands on Liam’s shoulders. “Go get ‘em, champ.”

“You know I actually have parents, right?” Liam asked. And Stiles didn’t answer. He just went to steal Derek’s beer. So that was probably something Liam would probably need to circle back on later.

Stiles really did have a good point though, so Liam waited what he hoped was a normal amount of time to tug Theo upstairs. “Do not panic,” Liam said on the way. “Okay? This isn’t a big deal.”

“Okay.” Theo’s tone was neutral, but it usually was.

Liam turned back to face him, his back against one side of the hallway. Theo matched him, leaning against the other side. “Okay,” he said, but then he realized Stiles was an idiot and this was the wrong time to do this.

“So what’s the not a big deal thing that had to happen right now, around other people?” Theo asked, so Liam could tell he was freaking out a little bit and it really wasn’t fair to just keep this from him now that he knew about it, so.

“Do you trust me?” Liam asked.

“Of course.”

“No, not like… do you really trust me, I mean.”

Theo frowned at him. “What’s going on?” he said.

Which wasn’t exactly an answer, and Liam wasn’t trying to take that in any wrong way but he also couldn’t help it, really. Okay, so there wasn’t any way Liam could think of to soft pedal this after all. “Why don’t you want to tell me things?”

That seemed to confuse Theo the most; he threw his hands out. “What are you even talking about, I tell you shit all the time!” he said.

“You haven’t wanted to tell me what you got for-“

“Seriously?” Theo demanded.

“Well! And then you keep not wanting to talk about, like, money, or your sexuality,” Liam said in a quieter tone, and Theo made a face Liam didn’t quite understand. “What! Why is it crazy for me to be worried about that?”

“Because none of that matters,” Theo insisted, coming a step closer.

“Yes it does!”

“Okay then I’ll tell you! Like I tell you everything else that actually is important. Because I love you, Liam. Because you listen to me and you really… I can tell you care, I think.”

“Of course I care,” Liam said quickly, when Theo was hesitating.

“Yeah. Okay, so.”

“And I love you too.”

“I know. So why are you freaking out about this? Just ask me.”

“Because! I dunno, I’m.” Liam bit on his lip for a second, and then met Theo’s eyes. “Safe space? Don’t be offended?”

Theo snorted. “Oh good. Good way to start.”

“Seriously though.”

“Won’t be offended,” Theo promised. And Liam knew he meant it, like was one of the few people who could mean it and turn his feelings off.

“You’re the one who said it before,” Liam said. “But. Like. I’m not trying to forget who you were, I know that’s still who you are, and I just. I don’t know. I guess I don’t totally get… why things changed. So I guess I felt like it could happen, where you just… go back.” 

Theo rolled his eyes. “I guess it was sometime in the months I spent in the middle of my own personal hell, re-evaluating how I’ve treated everyone in my life. Or the year where you were the only person keeping me out of there.” He was being sarcastic, but then he looked at Liam more seriously. “I mean, do you want the truth?”

“Yeah, dude!”

“It was you. This… pack,” he said with a grimace. “People having my back. And I know I’m not… good at emotions or anything, still, but I’m good at keeping score. So. I know how much you care and everything, and I’m trying to do as much as you do. And if I’m not getting it right you have to _tell me_ so I can do something about it, okay?”

Liam nodded, feeling very bashful. “Sorry,” he said.

“You’re goddamn right, you’re sorry,” Theo said with a growing smile, and came a few steps closer. “I’m sorry too, though. That you were upset.”

“It’s cool,” Liam said. “It makes sense the way you said it, I should’ve told you more of how I felt.”

“I got Scott,” Theo said. “For secret santa. And why do you care whatever word I call my sexuality or whatever?” He was close to Liam now, and Liam grabbed one of Theo’s hands.

“Because? What do you mean.”

“I like you, what else matters?”

Liam smiled. “Aw. Babe.”

“Babe,” Theo echoed, and kissed him.

So that was fine and Stiles was right and whatever. They got to get back to the party and now they were holding hands and really okay, together. Everybody got there eventually, or like everybody Liam knew but Scott was still waiting for something, standing in the kitchen with Kira and Derek and Stiles. Theo and Liam were over in the living room talking to Lydia and Malia when the door opened again, and Liam perked up instantly. This was someone who smelled like family, in a weird way, but not anybody he knew. And then he saw the people, and recognized their faces from Scott’s old Instagram posts. This was Isaac, and behind him was Allison, and they were-

“Um,” Theo said. “I thought Scott and Kira were dating.”

“They are,” Lydia said, and followed their gaze. To where Scott was kissing Isaac and Allison both hello, and then Kira did too and all of them hugged. “He’s just not _only_ dating Kira,” Lydia continued, and held her hand out to Theo. Theo pulled her up, and Lydia went over to say hi to Allison.

“Wow,” Liam said.

“Don’t get any ideas,” Theo said. “I’m bad at sharing.”

“Disappointed to hear that,” Jackson said from the armchair he was leaning on that Ethan was sitting in, with a kind of catlike grin that made Liam need to take his deep breaths again.

Scott was really good at sharing, though. The four of them seemed super happy together, and also happy not together. After a second, all the girls took over the couch, sitting on each other and eating off each others’ plates. So Liam tugged Theo over to the kitchen, to talk with the dudes who were helping Melissa get snacks in the oven, Scott and Isaac and Stiles and Derek. Liam squeezed them in between Isaac and Stiles, and tried to catch up with the conversation.

“-absolutely no way that they didn’t mean for that subtext to be read into the film,” Stiles was saying.

“Let me guess, Fast and the Furious?” Liam said to nobody in particular.

“Actually, yes,” Isaac answered. “How’d you know?”

Liam shrugged, abruptly a little nervous. “It’s always Fast and the Furious. I’m Liam.”

“Yeah, Scott’s mini-me, right?” Isaac said, looking down at him with a warm smirk. “Isaac.”

“Hi,” Liam said. “And this is Theo, my boyfriend.”

“Cool. Hi.”

Isaac was like, super tall and wearing a sweater that was cool, and he smelled like Scott and cold air and Liam had to admit, he was sort of wishing Isaac had stayed around because he was awesome. He teased Stiles better than anybody else, he made Scott go totally gooey and Melissa loved him, and basically everything about the pack made more sense with him here.

Allison’s dad came in after a bit, with extra reuseable bags of food. “Figured you might need a little help feeding the werewolves,” he said with a smile.

“Thanks, Argent,” Melissa said. “Find a hot French wife yet?” And Scott rolled his eyes.

“Nah,” Chris said. His eyes were super blue, in his dark coat. “Kind of hung up on my hot American wife.”

Derek heaved a very deep sigh, and tipped his head back to finish the rest of his beer in one go. Very calmly, Isaac covered Scott’s eyes while Chris and Melissa kissed, and then let go of him.

“Y’know,” Sheriff Stilinski said as he came in behind Chris and shut the door, “I took a semester of French, back in the day.” He was carrying his own bags of food and drinks, which he moved Stiles aside to set on the island.

“Let’s hear it,” Chris said, turning to look at him.

Sheriff paused, a lot like his son did, and then said, “Derriere.”

“Dad!” Stiles groaned, dropping his head down. “Please.”

“Pronunciation could use a little work,” Chris said, and then he and the Sheriff kissed too.

Uh. Okay. So that was also a thing? Liam looked at Scott, who was just sort of smiling in a bemused way, and then at Stiles who was a little pinker than usual. “So your dad’s queer too?” Theo asked, which was hilarious because that was basically exactly what Liam wanted to know.

“That’s a good word now, right?” Sheriff asked in a friendly tone.

“Yeah, honey,” Melissa said comfortingly.

“Dad,” Stiles said. “Have you even been _skimming_ the emails I’ve been sending you? The whole discourse about LGBTQ vocabulary was covered in like, August.”

“Oh, those are a mass-BCC type of things, then?” Derek asked Stiles in a deceptively pleasant tone.

“I do not want to hear it from you,” Stiles muttered, with an aggressive finger point into Derek’s shoulder. “You never reply either.”

Derek rolled his eyes. “And say what?”

“A little validation would be nice. I put a lot of work into those.”

“Yes,” Scott answered Theo. “But I mean basically everybody is, I think.” And Theo nodded like that made sense.

They all gathered in the living room to exchange their secret santa gifts. The three parents stayed in the kitchen, preparing a shitload of pizza rolls and pigs in blankets. Luckily, Lydia was happy with the perfume Liam got her - Malia shot him a grateful look, and Liam gave her a thumbs up that Jackson rolled his eyes at. Liam got a really cool jacket from Isaac that he put on immediately, and Theo got just an envelope that Liam kept looking over at, while they waited for it to be his turn.

“What do you think’s in there?” Liam whispered to him.

“I think we’ll find out in like three minutes,” Theo said, and hugged Liam closer with an arm around his neck. He was being pointedly possessive in a way Liam found funny enough to not object to. “Scott, you’re up next.”

Scott had Theo’s wrapped package in his lap, which Liam suspected probably smelled enough like Theo for him to guess whose this was from. But Scott waited anyways to be told, and grinned when Theo held up his hand. “Awesome. Thanks in advance,” he said, and pulled some of the paper off. “Whoa.” Isaac looked at the top of the box and raised his eyebrows.

“What is it?” Stiles demanded.

“A laptop. Dude, this is way over the price limit,” Scott said.

“I’ve got some extra making up to do,” Theo said with a grin. “Seriously don’t worry about it. Besides, I heard you talking about how you needed it for your classes. Didn’t you say your computer now is barely working?”

Stiles was glaring at Theo. “Idiot,” he said.

“Stiles!” Scott said.

“Open your thing,” Derek said to Theo. “Congrats, it’s from me.”

“I appreciate the ceremony,” Theo said dryly, and ripped open the card. Liam leaned over his shoulder to see what it said. The front of the card was a calming landscape. _Thinking of you_ , it said, and then in pen someone had added “ _r crushing credit card debt._ ” When Theo opened it, there was just a hand written message. _Merry Christmas. I will be paying whatever debt you’re in because it is ridiculous that you are in debt as an eighteen year old with no college degree. Car too._

That was pretty nice of him. Liam suspected that was why it took Theo several long, awkward seconds to figure out what to say.

“So if you think about it,” Stiles said to Scott, “Derek got this gift for you.”

“What,” Theo said. “Jealous? Worried I’m his new best friend?”

So secret santa devolved into ugly faces and sounds and gestures for a while, and Liam shared a smile with Mason and Corey, across the room. These were his friends, and Liam would get to know them forever. That was just about the best thing he could think of.

Melissa got them back on track by bringing over heaping plates of food and veggies. And once they were eating, it was easier to get everybody focused on gifts again. Well, almost on gifts.

“What do you _mean_ you didn’t know what to get Derek?” Stiles demanded of Corey. “His interests are cars and V-neck T shirts, it’s not exactly difficult.”

“I don’t know any of his interests!” Corey said defensively.

“None of us do,” Theo added, to support Corey which was nice. “He’s actively avoiding any sort of connection with us basically at all times.”

“You could ask me!” Stiles insisted.

“You’d tell him,” Liam said. Scott made a face that seemed to think Liam had a point, and that was basically the coolest thing ever. “And no one else knows.”

“I know,” Isaac said placidly. “But I wouldn’t tell anyone. Because I want Derek to have a bad Christmas.”

Stiles turned to look at Isaac, very affronted. “Now why would you say that?” he demanded. “Just because he was… not the most self-actualized alpha like, years ago?”

“One year,” Jackson said. “But who’s counting.”

“Hold on.” Stiles looked between everyone very sharply. “Am I the only one who likes Derek?” The silence was very awkward, but Liam was like ninety percent sure mostly everyone was keeping quiet for the sole purpose of annoying Stiles. Lydia was hiding her face with her hair. And it was working. “I thought you said he’s like family!” he demanded of Isaac, returning his attention to him.

“He is,” Isaac agreed.

“Stiles raises a good point, though,” Allison said with her mouth full, and then swallowed. “He is family. So I have to love him, but I don’t like him at all.” And Liam caught Derek smiling down at his plate, so it seemed like maybe he felt the same way.

“Nobody has to like anybody,” Malia said. “I mean I’m basically responsible for my mom and sister dying, so nobody-“

“Not true,” Stiles and Lydia said at the exact same time, and Scott echoed it a second later.

“I’m trying to help!” Malia said to the general group.

“No it’s okay,” Derek said. His smile was stifled again, so his expression was serious. “I’m used to being loathed. Don’t worry about it.”

Which only set Stiles off again, of course, but Stiles was fighting off a smile too. And there was nothing Scott seemed like more than peacekeeping something ridiculous, so he was happy and that made it easier than ever for everyone else to be happy too. They were seriously a pack. Even if that word was stupid, Liam didn’t mind in the moment because it meant family. Sitting next to Theo with their sides pressed together, with Lydia on Liam’s other side and Malia on the floor and just everybody all around. This was where they belonged.


End file.
